


Death is Part of the Process, Part Three: Girl Trouble

by Licoriceallsorts



Series: Death is Part of the Process [3]
Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Final Fantasy VII - Freeform, Gen, Materia, Midgar, Shinra, Turks - Freeform, world building
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2010-02-27
Updated: 2010-03-28
Packaged: 2017-10-07 14:12:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 27,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/65920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Licoriceallsorts/pseuds/Licoriceallsorts
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The events of Crisis Core and Before Crisis combined in one magnificent epic novel, told from the POV of the Turks. Action, angst, drama, humour, travel to exotic locations; death, sex, love and betrayal; illegitimate children and faulty materia.... This story has it all. Did I mention it stars Reno and Cissnei? Viewer discretion is advised.</p><p>This is the Third Part of "Death is Part of the Process". You really need to read at least Part Two first. Ideally, you should start at the beginning of Part One.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Reflections and Accommodations

** _In which Veld considers the evidence, Reno and Rude discuss Cissnei, and the Turks move house_ **

** _ _________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ _ **

_Above Plate..._          

 A number of reports landed on Commander Veld’s desk the next morning, confirming in writing that concatenation of events which he had already learnt about, piecemeal, through telephone conversations the previous day. He made a note of the key items on his pad:

            _Archive thief - Professor Hollander_

Hollander, once Hojo’s rival for leadership of the Science Department, but sidelined after the failure of Project G, had disappeared at about the same time as Genesis.

            _Genesis working with Hollander_

            This fact was now indisputable. Reno and Rude had chased Hollander into the underbelly of the plate and as far as Sector 5, but had been unable to capture him due to the relentless attacks by the Genesis copies. The clincher, though, was the attempt made by Genesis himself to kill, or possibly kidnap, Hojo, presumably on Hollander’s bidding. But why would a man as aristocratic and as arrogant as Genesis be willing to do Hollander’s dirty work for him? Hojo, when questioned by Tseng, had said that Genesis was ‘deteriorating’, whatever that meant. Mentally, maybe?  Tseng had asked him to explain, but Hojo had laughed and said explanations would be meaningless for those without scientific vision. God, what a piece of kak that man was.

            _Stolen documents relate to mass SOLDIER desertion incident, Wutai, October 1999_

            This was what Veld had expected. 

            _Secret lab Sector 5 reactor basement _

            How could Hollander and Genesis have hidden down there for so long undetected? Reeve was a genius, but the city he was building was a reflection of the way his own mind worked, a maze of dead ends and tortuous passageways and locked chambers. Veld had thought he knew Midgar like the back of his hand. Obviously he’d been wrong. Better tighten that up. __

_            Sephiroth’s loyalties? Angeal?_

            According to the report filed by Sephiroth, Angeal remained loyal to Shinra. Veld suspected that both Angeal’s and Sephiroth’s first loyalties were to their old friendships. All three of the fugitives – Genesis, Angeal, Hollander – had escaped; it seemed likely that they had been allowed to escape by SOLDIER.  And what about Lazard? What did he know? What was his part in this? That information was vital. Cissnei would have to start trying a bit harder. __

            Genesis and Hollander. AVALANCHE. Wutai. Shinra’s enemies were multiplying.

            Veld tapped the pen against his silicon knuckles.  There was one more thing to add. He did not yet know its significance, if any, but his job was to strategize, and to do this he needed to consider all eventualities, all variables, even one as unforeseen, as apparently random, as this:

            _In the course of pursuing Hollander, SOLDIER Zack Fair fell from Reactor Five into the slum church below and made contact with the primary objective, Aerith Gainsborough._

 

_*_

 

_Below plate...._

            “So,” said Rude to Reno. “Cissnei. What gives?”

            They were down in _The Live and Let Live_ in the Sector Two slums. This bar was their mutual secret, the place they went to when they wanted to be sure none of the other Turks would find them. _The Live and Let Live_ was a rusty old cargo container with the roof removed, where the rotgut brewed in the tin-can still out back cost a gil a shot, and most of the clientele were the saddest kind of crook: hungry, ragged petty thieves, kids and old men.  Reno had done a lot of his underage drinking here, before the Chief plucked him out of the mob, raised him plateside, and made him somebody.

            “I dunno,” said Reno. “I just can’t stop thinking about her.”

            “But what happened?”

            “I dunno. She got sent off to SOLDIER and I didn’t see her for a while and then when I did, wham! Sucker punch. I never saw it coming.”

            “Seriously?”

            “You did. I remember. You see it all, don’t you, Rude? And you keep it all to yourself. Otherwise I wouldn’t be telling you this.”

            “If the Chief finds out…”

            “Finds out what?” Reno threw back his head and drained his glass. “She’s got Zack. She isn’t interested in me.”

            “She kissed you.”

            “Bartender, two more. Yeah. That was one hell of a bizarre day, wasn’t it? Every time I thought it couldn’t get any more random, it did. I nearly kissed _you_, I was so fucking delirious to escape with my skin intact. She was glad to see me alive, that’s all. Ciss and I are still friends, I think. That’s what makes it all so…. so… weird.”

            “You better be careful you don’t mess up her mission with SOLDIER. “

            “Drink,” said Reno. “C’mon. Keep up. Down the hatch.  I’m not going to do anything stupid, OK? She doesn’t want me. I’ll just live with it and then I’ll get over it.”

            “Find someone else,” Rude suggested.

            “Tried it. Doesn’t work.”

            While he talked, Reno kept his hands busy building a wall out of their empty shot glasses. Rude was a little alarmed to see just how big the wall was becoming. He didn’t think he’d drunk more than he usually did. So how much was Reno putting away?

            “Reno,” he said after a moment, “Do you – love her?”

            Reno set down the glass he’d just drained. He turned it on its side and began spinning it. “Man,” he said, “I don’t even know what that means. I mean, sure, I say it, all the time. _Yeah, ‘course I love you, baby, ‘course I’ll call you._ You know. That crap. And sometimes I wonder how it would be with Ciss and me. What if we did get it together? And what if after a week I couldn’t stand the sight of her any more?”

            He balanced the final glass on top of the wall. Then, with a vicious jab of his finger, he knocked the lynchpin loose and all the glasses came tumbling down onto the zinc tabletop, chipping, cracking, smashing

  “Music to my ears,” Reno grinned. “Yeah, yeah,” he added with a sigh as the angry bartender approached. “I’ll pay.”    

 

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________       

 

** _Departmental Email, Administrative Research_ **

_Subject:     New security measures_

_From:       Director Veld_

_To:          All staff_

_Date:       7_ _th_ _ April 2001_

_ In view of the multiple threats to Shinra that have surfaced in recent months, I feel it is necessary to take certain steps to ensure your protection, both on a personal level and as assets of this company which we are sworn to serve. I have therefore made arrangements for you to move into corporate housing on Warehouse Street in Sector 8._

_The property is equipped with security protection on a par with that used for the President, and is accessible to the Shinra Building via an underground passageway. There are a gym and sauna in the basement. Each of you will be allocated a furnished studio apartment with cooking facilities and private washroom.  Family members may not accompany you.  I intend this move to be a temporary measure only, for the duration of the current crisis, and I have every confidence that you will understand the need for these measures and make them work to our advantage.  The deadline for moving in is the end of this week._

Reno read through the Commander’s email and mentally shrugged.  One bolt-hole was as good as another, and Veld had said nothing about a curfew. If the others got on his nerves too much in the new place he could just lock the door and turn up the volume on his headphones. At least there’d always be someone around to talk to. As long as he could keep his cleaner, or _a_ cleaner, he could live with the new arrangements. There wasn’t much more than a suitcase worth of stuff to move from his apartment anyway. Rude wasn’t looking happy, though. Well, he was a private kind of guy.  Probably hated the thought of someone else seeing his boxers go round in the washing machine. Funny, the things they each got pissy about.

            Aviva and Cavour already lived in the company housing, so no change for them.  As for Mink, she’d obviously been born a Turk: whatever she was asked to do, she did, no fussing.

            “What about you, Knox?” asked Rosalind. “What will you do about Barbara and the boys?”

            Knox had taken off his glasses and was polishing them on his shirt. “They’ve gone back to Mideel. Midgar’s no place for kids right now. They’re staying with her parents. The boys are playing in the sunshine, climbing trees. They’ll be OK.” He put his glasses back on. Looking at no one in particular, he added, “You might as well know, Barbara and I have separated.”

            A shocked silence fell. Knox and Barbara had seemed to all of them like one of those rock-s

olid couples whom only death could part.

            “I’m sorry to hear that,” said broken-nosed Mozo at last.

            “It’s been a while coming. She thought she could handle this life, but she can’t. It’s better like this, actually.  I used to worry they might be targeted. Having them gone – it’s a weight off my mind.”

            He sounded as if he’d almost succeeded in making himself believe it.

            One by one they made the move into their new home.  The apartments were characterless: clean lines and simple furniture, with blue Shinra tiles, blue recessed lighting, and the red company logo on the walls.  Mozo covered his floor with bright Costa tapestries and hung up big photographs of sunrises and flowers. Who would have guessed the ex-detective had such a colourful side? Knox brought his bookcase, his rugs from home, the photos of his family, and the little clay pots his kids had made in school.  On Rosalind’s shelves the books were neatly arranged according to height, colour, and subject matter, and her shoes stood smartly side by side on the door mat. Cavour had pin-up calendars from tire companies, and stacks of gun magazines tied together with string.  Aviva’s walls were plastered with posters of LOVELESS actors and singers from the slum’s metal bands; her bed was heaped with cushions shaped like moogles, chocobos, and cats. New clothes, the price tags still attached, burst out of her closet.  

            Rude showed up on the appointed day with a guitar slung over his back. Aviva was delighted. “Play something for us,” she begged him.

            “Some other time.”

            Tseng’s studio, from what brief glimpses they caught of it through the doorway, was like an office: laptop, printer, files; a pressed suit hanging on the bathroom door; and always a vase of flowers, yellow and white.

            Mink and Reno brought their clothes.

            The only other thing Reno brought to his new apartment was a toy helicopter that he’d bought from a kid in the slums. It had been soldered together from old copper wire and pieces of cooking-oil cans, and was so skillfully made that the blades spun round when he breathed on them.

            He quickly found himself missing the balcony of his old apartment.

 Still, it didn’t take him long to re-wire the coded lock for the hatchway that gave access to the flat roof, and soon he was sleeping up there more often than not.  Sometimes the little cat kept him company. It didn’t seem to want to be with Reno, particularly; rather, they both happened to find themselves in the same place at the same time. It sat on the eaves with its back to him, beyond arm’s reach, its tail curled round its forepaws, its face turned up to the clouds.

            The one Turk missing was Cissnei, but that was just as well, Reno reflected. He had no idea where she was living these days. And that was just as well, too.  He didn’t want to degenerate into some kind of pathetic lust-crazed stalker.

            She never called. She didn’t email.  So he didn’t either. _I can take a hint_, he thought. Occasionally he saw her at a distance, walking through Fountain Square, or in the mezzanine waiting for the elevator. He always turned the other way, wondering, as he did so, whether she did the same when she saw him first.

            About two weeks after they moved into the corporate housing, Tseng announced during one of the morning briefings that she had left Midgar to accompany Director Lazard on a global tour of Shinra’s military bases. She would be gone, he said, for several months. Reno couldn’t say exactly how he felt when he heard that. He wanted to feel glad. He was pretty sure he felt relieved.

            The weeks passed. One blonde swimsuit girl replaced another on Cavour’s calendar as April turned to May and then May to June, and it began to look as if Veld had been overly alarmist in insisting they all move to secure quarters. Wutai was behaving itself. AVALANCHE had gone silent. Perhaps the assault on Junon had been the terrorists’ one throw of the dice, though Veld insisted that what little information they possessed pointed to the likelihood of further attacks. Genesis, Angeal, and Hollander seemed to have vanished off the face of the earth. Sephiroth had been reduced to hunting monsters to keep his hand in. Midgar was quieter than Reno had ever known it.  Fighting the occasional chimera bug, chasing a mugger, busting the odd street dealer had become major events, report-worthy.  Better were the missions when he went with Rude or Mozo or Mink or Aviva to some godforsaken corner of the planet to chase up leads on AVALANCHE.  The leads never came to anything, but at least he was flying.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's note: the helicopter is my own. It seemed like the kind of thing that would appeal to Reno. Long before I knew these characters, in the days when I lived in Sudan, I bought it from a refugee kid in a Khartoum souk. It's a helicopter gunship. On the cooking oil tin are the words "USAID. A gift from the people of the United States of America."


	2. Moments from the Present

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which we get to know the Turks better, and spy on Zack and Aerith

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An important additional scene has been added to the end of this chapter 8/3/10

_Thoughts from Afar_

Reno and Rude receive postcards from Cissnei. She’s in Wutai now. Rude’s postcard has a picture of Da Chao. Reno’s shows a girl in traditional Wuteng dress. On the back Cissnei has written _Have been captured by white slavers. Send money!_ He sticks it on his fridge with a magnet, and looks at it often.

            One day, he thinks, I’ll be able to tell her. And we’ll have a good laugh.

 

*

 

_In Nibelheim with Mink._  

The rumoured AVALANCHE activity turns out to be nothing but a bunch of kids who found some raw materia in the reactor’s slagheap, blew a hole in a farmer’s barn, and are too scared to admit it. Mink patiently coaxes the truth from them. Reno wouldn’t have known how. Watching her handle those kids gets him thinking.

            When they’re done she says she wants to walk up the mountain before they return to Midgar. Reno can come with her or not; she doesn’t care. Since the alternative is sitting around doing nothing, he chooses the walk. She doesn’t talk much, ever. Yet people tell her things.  Reno starts telling her about when he was a kid: he tells her the story of how he was recruited into the Turks, which is no secret, but he doesn’t normally bore people with it either.  He talks and Mink listens, and while he talks he looks at her long hair blowing in the wind, thick and silver streaked with black, and her strong face with its high cheekbones. Beautiful; forbidding.  He wonders what she does for fun – or what she did, and if there was ever a time when she smiled.

 

_*_

_Playing poker with Mozo._ 

Nothing about Mozo is what it seems. His is the perfect poker face, blunt-featured, beetle browed, dull-eyed. You have to know him to appreciate his intelligence. His clumsy looking hands with their sausage fingers are nimble at pulling cards from his sleeve.  He is willing to admit his tricks and teach them to Reno, because he would never cheat a co-worker. Mozo’s quite the gentleman with the ladies, holding doors for them, draping his jacket around chilly slim shoulders. In the smokey backrooms of the upper city, where fortunes can be won and lost in a night, he sniffs out the wolves bent on fleecing the innocent and the naïve.  His amusement is to cheat the cheat: it’s kind of a private mission of his, his art, poker poetry.  At the end of the night he lets an ace fall from his shirt cuff in full sight of the table. His target, enraged by such perfidy, seizes Mozo’s collar and spits insults in his face – _swindler! Turk! - _until abruptly silenced by the cold barrel of Mozo’s gun pressing against his ear.

            Reno says, “One day you won’t be the only one with a gun.”

            Mozo smiles. “I like to gamble.”

 

*

_The problem with materia_

There’s no pleasure without pain. They say that before Knox met Barbara he had a problem with materia; that he’d take unnecessary risks, even screw up on purpose, get himself hurt deliberately, for the sake of the Cure. Reno’s heard the same story about other Turks: dead Turks. He can see how easily a taste for it might creep up on a man.  In his opinion, the smart thing is to avoid getting too dependent on any one substance.  That’s the advice he gives the rookies.

            Anyway, what they say about Knox is that he was as wild as anyone until he met Barbara. She made him clean up his act. Now that she’s left and taken the kids with her, his partners watch him for signs of going off the rails, the way guys cut loose from their moorings often do. 

            Rosalind says that for Knox the move to the company housing is a blessing in disguise.  It has to be better than living alone in the home he once shared with his family. Reno says families are a liability. That’s just a fact. Rude observes that Knox seems to be holding it together OK. Mozo says, well, maybe he really believes that Barbara and the kids are better off where they are, better off without him. Is there any kind of pleasure, Mozo wonders, which could offset that pain?

 

*

 

_Rookies!_

Cavour is handsome in a coarse-grained kind of way.  His black hair is thick and slightly oily; his large eyes are like a calf’s eyes, liquid brown, with long dark lashes, and like an animal’s eyes they hold no emotion.  He’s a good partner, focused, efficient, and deadly, following orders to the letter. Don Corneo knows how to train his men.

            But the Don rules the slums with bare knuckles. Shinra wears a velvet glove. Cavour has had some trouble grasping the distinction.  He doesn’t seem to know the meaning of the word ‘discrete’.  Entrusted with the simple assassination of a Wuteng double-agent, he tracks his target down to a pavement café in the middle of a busy lunch-hour and sprays his brains over five tables full of customers; the whole department has to work overtime for the next three days in the scramble to cover up his error of judgement.

            For his next mission, Veld partners him with Reno and sends them the two of them to Costa del Sol, to investigate reports that a woman matching Aviva’s description of the AVALANCHE leader was recently treated in a clinic there.  As usual, the lead goes nowhere; the patient turns out to be a local housewife and mother of three.  Reno’s ready to head home, but Cavour says he needs to go to the bank. While Reno’s waiting outside, having a smoke, a boy comes past him - a flaxen-haired, pink-cheeked boy so pretty that at first glance Reno thinks he’s a girl. The boy throws him a smile (one gold tooth among the ivory, flash of charm) and then goes into the bank; Reno catches a glimpse of a blue and black tattoo on the nape of the boy’s neck. He finishes his cigarette, and is thinking about having another when he hears screaming inside the bank, followed by gunshots.

            He goes in and sees a dozen people crouched against the far wall, covering their heads with their arms.  The bank teller has her hands in the air.  A man is writhing on ground near Reno, blood pulsing from the bullet wound in his thigh.  Cavour and the pretty boy are facing each other, smoking pistols in hand. Reno wonders how a marksman like Cavour could have missed. Pretty Boy must be fast, though his aim is poor – from the angle of things, he’s the one who shot the unlucky bastard dying slowly and noisily on the floor by Reno’s feet.

            Reno needs only a split-second to take all this in. Cavour glances his way. Pretty Boy takes advantage of Cavour’s momentary distraction: with his left hand he throws a nunchuk at Cavour’s head and knocks him out cold. _Oh, for God’s sake_, thinks Reno, getting out his rod and casting a bolt at Pretty Boy that stuns him into immobility. He takes the boy’s gun and ties his hands behind his back, using Cavour’s tie.

            “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” mumbles the boy through numb lips. “I didn’t mean to hurt anybody. I just needed the money.”

            Reno gets a glass of water from the water cooler and throws it into Cavour’s face. He moves swiftly over to the dying man, puts his fingers into the wound, digs out the bullet, Cures him. Cavour has come to, groaning. Reno lifts him to his feet and drags him from the bank before the grateful customers can mob them.

            That afternoon, back in Midgar, Reno files his report. Tseng reads it and passes it on to Commander Veld, whose interest is immediately piqued.  “So he dodged one of Cavour’s bullets, eh?” he remarks to Tseng. “I think we need to take a look at this one.” 

            Four weeks later, the Department’s newest rookie starts work on patrol in Sector 8. He calls himself Skeeter.  He says he’s seventeen years old. From his fairness and the pale blue of his eyes they can see that he’s a Northerner. Until two years ago, he tells them, he lived in Bone Village with his family, hunting for naturally-occurring materia and helping his parents run their shop. After they were killed in a mis-timed explosion, his brother threw him out, and since then he’s been wandering around, trying to scratch a living any way he can. He blushes when he says this. It’s easy to guess at some of the things such a pretty boy has had to do.

            The other Turks take to Skeeter straight away.  He has a friendly, open manner; he’s enthusiastic and easy-going, full of admiration for them, and thankful to have been given such a chance. So they say, “Want us to sort out your brother for you?”

Skeeter is overwhelmed. “Oh, gee, thanks, guys. But really, no, it’s OK. Everything’s worked out for the best, hasn’t it?  I don’t bear him any grudges. And he’s still my brother, after all.”

            Skeeter’s one to let bygones be bygones.

 

*

 

_Rosalind, letting her hair down_

Metaphorically speaking, because she keeps it bobbed at the line of her earlobes, which to Reno’s eye has to be the unsexiest hairstyle ever invented.  In their little family, Rosalind’s the practical one, the one who always knows where to look for an answer to a question, the one who has memorized the contents of the company handbook, who can lend you a pen whenever you need one; the one who will iron Reno’s shirts for him even though he keeps telling her that he _prefers_ his shirts unironed, that ironed shirts are stiff and scratchy.  She simply ignores him. Unlike the rest of them, Rosalind has living relatives: a much younger sister called Elena, and a father who is the Head of Ballistics at the Military Academy in Junon.  She was raised there, in the barracks. Whenever she refers to her father, which isn’t often, she calls him Colonel Franks. 

            Rosalind never swears. She is usually the last person in the room to laugh at a joke.  She doesn’t even drink much, though under Rude’s tutelage and Reno’s encouragement, she’s improving.  Her shoes are always polished. She’s often the one who gets left behind in the office when the others go out on missions, because she’s so detail-oriented: she can spend all day sifting through intel reports and be as meticulous at the end as she was at the beginning.

            She’s also a dead shot with a handgun.

            One day in the middle of June Reno has to come back to the Shinra Building to fetch a tool he left behind. As he steps out of the elevator he hears music: a popular song by one of Aviva’s metal bands is playing on the radio. He takes a few steps towards the office. The door is open. What he sees stops him dead in his tracks.

            Rosalind is dancing. She isn’t just shuffling her feet from side to side, tapping her toe, no – she’s whirling round, arms wide, kicking her heels up and swinging her hips as she sings along to the music.

            Reno, thinking fast, returns to the elevator and goes back down to the mezzanine floor. From here he calls Rosalind and tells her he’s coming up for something he forgot. “Tch,” chides Rosalind, “It’s lucky for you your head is attached to your shoulders.”

 

*

 

_Aviva in motion._ 

Reno is running on the treadmill, but really he is watching her turn cartwheels and backflips and aerial somersaults all over the mats. Her body is perfect for this, flat-chested, compact, sinewy.  She lands and rebounds as if she has springs built into her feet. Reno wishes he could bounce like that.  He asks, “Where did you learn those moves?”

            Unlike Mink, Aviva is always happy to chatter. “In the show. It was part of my act. I can throw knives while I turn somersaults. Want to see?”

            There are no knives in the gym, so he gives her his shoes to use instead.  One of them nearly hits him in the face. “Was killing your audience part of the act too?”

            “Only sometimes,” she laughs. Maybe she’s serious.

            “Did you travel around?”

            “Yeah, a lot. None of those mining towns are rich.  We’d play for a few days, then move on. Summer season we’d go to Costa. But Corel was our base.”

            “Pay any good?”

            “I wasn’t paid.” She gives him a puzzled look. Like he should know this.

            If he asked, she’d tell.  In fact, he sometimes gets the feeling that she believes he knows all about her already.  But he doesn’t ask. He doesn’t need her to tell him what a shovel-load of shit this world can be.  The better question, the real question, would be how she manages to be so happy all the time.  But maybe he was the same when he was fifteen.  He thinks he was. He can’t remember.

 

*

 

_Veld, angry_

__          In any case, age means nothing. The youngest Turks kill, with as little compunction as their elders, monsters of all kinds, four-legged and two-legged; thieves, liars, crooks, pirates, child-devourers; breakers of the peace; all enemies of Shinra, the ones that roar, the ones that plead, and the ones that fight back.  During a raid on a black market weapons cache Cavour is shot in the chest; the bullet punctures his lung, but he lives, and spends two weeks in the infirmary. Down in the slum bar that Rude, Reno, and Mozo introduced him to, Skeeter’s drink is spiked with poison, and only the bar owner’s quick thinking (fear sharpens the mind wonderfully) gets the antidote down him in time. 

          Veld rarely does field work, but this is different. He brings Tseng and Reno with him to the bar. The owner is, if not happy, at least very willing to remember, in copious detail, who was in the bar that night and where they were sitting and what they did. The trail takes them fairly swiftly to the door of a man they have recently begun to suspect of involvement in the contraband materia trade. Veld knocks on the front door and asks to see him. The man chooses to leave by the back door instead, only to find Reno waiting for him around the corner. Reno pins him down and holds him there until Veld arrives. The man is making quite a noise, and a crowd is gathering. In what passes for broad daylight in Midgar, Veld shoots him through the back of the neck. Discretion is not desirable in this case, and explanations are not necessary: the witnesses to this execution will work out the reason for themselves.

          It never ceases to amaze Reno how stupid some people can be.

 

*

 

_Surveillance Duty_

It’s not just flowers that are blooming in the Church these days.

As far as Reno is concerned, spying on the Ancient has been, until recently, one of his job’s more tedious chores. She never does anything interesting, and nothing worthy of report ever takes place to break up the monotony of her days.  Her blithe acceptance of her lot, her sunny unquestioning contentment, have led him to assume she must be simple-mind

ed.  Cer tainly she has never given any sign that she’s aware of his presence, whether he’s watching her from up in the roof-beams, his face smeared with soot, a black woolly cap pulled over his beacon of hair, or following her through the monster-infested streets to ensure she reaches the safety of Elmyra Gainsborough’s house.  He has never spoken to her. That’s the Boss’s job. As far as she knows, Tseng is her only protector, or gaoler.  According to Tseng, she claims not to know about any Promised Land. The Chief does not believe her. But Reno believes her. It’s perfectly clear to him that Aerith knows practically nothing at all.  Which, for someone raised in the slums, and a pretty girl at that, is itself a kind of miracle. One that she can thank Tseng for, if thanks are in order.

            That’s how it was, anyway, until the day Zack Fair came crashing into her life.

            Her innocence has an electrical quality. Reno is not vulnerable to it, but he can see the effect it’s having on Cissnei’s lover. It’s like a magnet, at once attracting him and yet holding him at bay.  It is light and warmth, in a place without sunshine.  It’s all the things he joined SOLDIER to defend.

            Of course, he doesn’t know she’s an Ancient. That’s very highly classified information. The new Turks haven’t been told, either. Not even the Board of Directors knows. There’s always a risk the girl might decide to tell him herself, but Reno’s willing to bet she won’t. She’s pretty self-conscious about the whole normality thing. The two of them discuss it a lot.  Zack tells her normality is over-rated. The poor dumb chick has no idea she’s being fed a line.

            Meanwhile, Reno’s caught up in his own dilemma. What should he do about Cissnei? Should he let her know? Should he keep his big mouth shut?

            It’s not like she’s ever come right out and told him that she’s sleeping with Zack, that she’s in love with the target of her mission.  Still, he’s pretty sure that she knows that he knows. Her silence speaks volumes there.  In fact, he reckons, he and Rude are almost certainly the only two who know anything about it. If Tseng and the Chief ever found out – if they even suspected she had a conflict of interests – they’d pull her out of SOLDIER faster than she could blink.

            And Ciss can be so prickly. Suppose he, Reno, as a friend, did try to warn her – well, she’d be just as likely to kick him as thank him.

            So maybe he should be smart for a change and keep it zipped. Maybe the whole sexless affair between the SOLDIER and the Ancient will fizzle out soon of its own accord. How long can a virginal teenager expect to hold the interest of a man like Zack, when he knows he’s got a woman like Cissnei waiting for him upstairs? Maybe it’ll all be OK….

            Man, Cissnei sure picked the wrong time to go sashaying off round the planet with Director Lazard. While the cat’s away…. Though Reno supposes she didn’t have much choice. Why’d Lazard take her along, anyway? As a bodyguard? He has plenty of third classes for that. Why outsource to the Turks?  Or maybe she volunteered to go so that Zack can discover how much he misses her when she’s not around. If that’s her plan, then she’s miscalculated. Badly.

            Somebody’s going to get hurt. And it won’t be the Ancient, holding Cissnei’s lover effortlessly in her orbit. And it won’t be that first class bastard Zack Fair. So who does that leave?

            He should tell her.

            He should mind his own business.

            Bloody hell. This would all be so much, much easier if he didn’t have an ulterior motive. If he didn’t fancy Cissnei so badly himself.

            If she wasn’t his friend.

            One night after surveillance duty Reno comes back late to the company housing with more than a few drinks inside him and sees Tseng’s light shining under the door, and all at once he knows what he must do, so he knocks on the door and without waiting for an invitation opens it and falls into Tseng’s room; as he hits the floor he catches a glimpse of Tseng sitting at the table, working on his laptop.

            “Ow,” says Reno.

            He hears footsteps, feels Tseng looming over him.

            “What do you want?” Tseng’s voice is the voice of midnight and shadows.

            “Boss,” says Reno face down on the floor, “When you gonna do something about Zack Fair and the Ancient?”

            Tseng takes hold of him by the armpits and hauls him into a sitting position.  Then Tseng leans forward, so close that Reno goes cross-eyed trying to stay focused on the dot in the middle of his forehead. Tseng sniffs Reno’s breath.

.            “Bourbon,” he says. “When did that start? I though you were a beer man.”

            “Beer tastes like puke. Whiskey tastes like fire. Now answer my question.”

            “But why should I do anything?” says Tseng, too quickly.

            Reno wants to say _because she’s yours_, but even after half a bottle of bourbon his sense of self-preservation is too strong.

            “He makes her happy,” Tseng adds, with the conviction of a man who has fought and won a long argument with himself. 

            “Happy? He’s a two-timing shit. We could kill him, Boss. You and me. No one would ever know.”

            Tseng’s response is to ignore this. He walks across the apartment to the kitchenette, fills a glass from the cold tap, and puts it into Reno’s hand. “Drink,” he says. “And listen. Whatever it is you think you know, you’re wrong. Zack Fair’s a decent guy. I’ve worked with him. He won’t harm her.  She doesn’t have a very favourable impression of Shinra, but he may be able to change that. The Commander sees no need to intervene.  That’s all you need to know. Now – “   Tseng takes hold of Reno by the upper arm and pulls. The Boss may look slight next to Mozo or Rude, but he’s all muscle.  Reno finds himself on his feet. A push sends him out the door. “Go to bed. Drink plenty of water. Try to be sober in the morning.”

            The door shuts and locks. 

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

On the other side of the locked door, Tseng went to open a window. Reno was gone, but the smell of alcohol still lingered.

            For some time Tseng had been at a loss to account for Reno’s animosity towards Zack Fair. To the best of his knowledge, Reno hardly knew the SOLDIER. They had never been on a mission together. And Reno rarely felt strongly enough about anyone to dislike them. Indeed, this detachment of his was one of the qualities that made him a good Turk. 

            But just now the truth had dawned. Say what you liked about Reno, you had to admit he was loyal to his partners. He must have seen something he wasn’t meant to see and had concluded, wrongly, that Zack was mistreating Cissnei. Tseng would have to speak to her about that. She couldn’t start getting careless, not now. Too much was at stake.

            Zack Fair. Something of a wild card, that young man. Throwing the best laid plans into disarray.  Still, it could have been worse. Much worse.

            Aerith was no longer a child, and she was beautiful, like her mother. Men turned to look at her when she walked through the streets. Tseng had seen them, though they had not seen him.  Zack, on the other hand, could not be invisible if he tried. Having a SOLDIER First Class for a boyfriend cast a protective spell around Aerith that worked its magic even when neither Zack nor Tseng could be present to watch over her. So there was that to be grateful for.

            She had called herself ‘not normal’ - yet she was in so many ways the most normal girl imaginable. She wanted a boyfriend; she wanted love. She wanted to dance and go to parties. Like every creature that drew breath, she wanted to live.  If it hadn’t been Zack it would have been some other boy, some Wall Market punk with pretty eyes and a sweet tongue, some wheeler-dealer bold enough to penetrate her defenses, some ducker and diver, thief and liar, the type that the slum bred like flies. At least Zack was an honest boy from a good home. The way he handled Aerith was almost reverent, as if he instinctively understood the real reason why she was always to be found in the church.  So there was that to be grateful for, too. 

            Zack had many admirable qualities. Tseng had worked with him, and studied him, in Banora and on several other missions, and had come to know him much better than Zack would have suspected from the minimal conversation they exchanged. For a First Class, he was remarkably modest; that was probably the legacy of Angeal.  He was forthright, sincere, respectful, obedient, ambitious - and clueless. How long he would stay that way was of course another question, but for now, it was something else to be grateful for.

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Skeeter is Turk J, male, nunchuk


	3. Aviva Screws Up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Aviva exercises her own judgement, Cloud make another brief appearance, and Veld and Tseng must confront an unwelcome truth

            On July 28th, 2001, Aviva screwed up. Veld had been wondering when this would happen.

            She was so good in so many ways; she was quick, resilient, skillful and resourceful. But she had a tendency to form her own judgments, to think in terms of right and wrong, good guys and bad guys, not understanding yet that in Midgar such terms were meaningless.  If she did not grow up fast, she would make herself unhappy, and become a danger to herself and everyone around her.

            Her orders had been crystal clear, yet she had deliberately disobeyed them. It was a good thing she was willing to admit it. This admission went some little way towards mitigating her offense; Veld deeply disliked having to call on witnesses to his Turks’ transgressions. Nevertheless, the consequences of her failure were likely to be far-reaching. She had saved one life today, but at the cost of how many in the future? Hadn’t she, in fact, really been thinking of herself? She had been self-indulgent; sentimental.

            Aviva hardly needed the beating. Her Commander’s words cut deeper.  He had believed in her, rescued her, given her work worth doing, made her proud of herself, and she’d failed him. In the middle of the floor she stood with her hands hanging at her sides, stoop-shouldered, wracked by shuddering sobs, her mouth a miserable circle and her eyes swollen with tears. 

            It would have been so easy and, one might say, natural, to scoop her up and give her a hug and say _there now, sweetheart, don’t cry, you’re a good girl._ 

            But Midgar was nothing if not unnatural. And she was not, could not be, a good girl, not if she was to be any use to him. Not if she was going to survive.

            Veld locked her in the punishment cell.

            What she never knew was how long he sat there on the other side of the door, his hand over his face, remembering another girl not so much younger than Aviva, battering against the door of the bedroom where he had banished her – for what, he couldn’t remember. Insolence, maybe, or some dangerous stunt.

            He had failed to save his daughter.  He wouldn’t fail again. Turks did not fail.  Midgar was a sewer of a city, a place where the trash floated to the top, where dogs ate dogs and rats ate their fellow rats and feral children fought one another for the scraps. It was impossible to save them all. Even amongst those who deserved to be saved, most had been, would be, drowned. But Veld would not let his Turks sink. He would preserve Aviva, and all of them, in this ark he had built with his own hands, the good ship Department of Administrative Research.

 

*

 

            Tseng had left the building, so when Aviva’s time in the cooler was up Veld called down to the office for someone to let her out, and got Reno.

            “Is this like a promotion, Chief? ‘Cause if it is, I think we should be talking pay rise.”

            “I’m not in the mood for your humour this morning.  Just go get her.”

            Being the one who unlocked the door felt strange to Reno; actually, it _did _feel like a promotion. Aviva shrank from the light, curling tighter into herself.

            “Veev, you have to come out of there sometime.”

            “Leave me alone! I’m never coming out! I wish I was dead!”

            “Sure you do,” he said, reaching in to drag her out by the ankle. It was like trying to hold on to a fish. She kicked and wriggled and struggled. Eventually he pulled her into the blue light. The fight went out of her, and she lay on her back on the floor, an arm flung over her eyes.

            “How’re you feeling?” he asked.

            “I hate myself!“ Her small body shook from head to foot, with passion and maybe also with pain.  “I _hate_ myself! I’m useless!”

            Reno squatted down beside her. “Come on, don’t make such a drama out of it.”

            “That’s easy for _you_ to say! You didn’t hear what he _said_! You don’t know what it’s _like_!”

            Reno made a sound that was part laugh, part snort. Where had she picked up this mistaken impression of him? “Veev, I’ve been in here more times than I can count.”

            That made her calm down a little. “_You_? But why?”

            “First time was the day the Chief hired me. Next time was when I re-wired the elevators so they’d only stop alternately at the mezzanine and Mayor Domino’s floor. Seemed like a good idea at the time,” he grinned. “I think we still have the tapes somewhere.  Last time was just before you joined us. I set fire to the Sector Seven slums. That wasn’t on purpose.  Anyway, you get the idea. You want to tell me what happened?”

            He knew the basic facts of the failed mission already: Tseng had given them an outline at the morning’s briefing. As Commander Veld had predicted, AVALANCHE had finally struck again yesterday afternoon, their target a data disk containing top secret information on the SOLDIER program.  This disk had been stored in the archive vaults buried below the Sector Seven slums, but because of its sensitive nature the President had taken the decision to transfer it back to Headquarters, where security had been significantly tightened since Hollander’s raid.  Dr Samira Rayleigh, a young scientist from Hojo’s team, was sent to fetch it, and a troop of Heidegger’s grunts had gone along as her escort.  Veld had insisted one of his Turks be included in the party. As usual, his instincts were right:  AVALANCHE had attacked them en masse at the train station, using a new kind of operative, black-clad, highly-trained, and very dangerous.  Aviva and the grunts had managed to battle their way onto the train with Dr Rayleigh and the disk, but AVALANCHE pursued them, and in the fight that followed all but one of the grunts had been killed. At some point Dr Rayleigh had become separ

ated from the disk. Torn between recovering the disk and saving Dr Rayleigh, Aviva and the surviving grunt had chosen Rayleigh. The disk was now in the hands of AVALANCHE, and there was hell to pay upstairs.

            Reno smoked a cigarette while she told the story. At the end she said, “I just – I see now it was selfish, but I just didn’t want him to think I was a bad person.”

            “Who? Heidegger’s guy?”

            “He was the same one who was in the helicopter with us when we went to Junon.”

            “Yeah?” said Reno. “I’ve seen him around. The spikey blond one. He’s quite the survivor.”

            “He’s awesome with a sword. Dr Rayleigh and I would both be dead if it wasn’t for him. He told me he wants to be in SOLDIER but they won’t take him because he’s too short.”

            “That’s too bad,” said Reno, “Because he’d fit right in. Nobody in SOLDIER knows how to obey an order.”

            “It was my orders to save the disk, not his,” Aviva protested. “His orders were to protect Dr Rayleigh.  But we couldn’t do both. And he said that people were more important than things. And I didn’t know what to do.  What he said sounded right. She was screaming for help. Disks don’t scream for help. I couldn’t just cold-bloodedly let them kill her.  It seemed like I had no choice. I thought I was doing what was best.”

            “So don’t think so hard next time,” said Reno. “That’s what the Chief is for. Seriously, Veev. Once you start second-guessing what the grunts and the typing pool and the goddamn _tea lady _think you should do, you’re dead. We don’t have time for that kind of crap.”

            Aviva sighed. “I love this job so much. But you know what I _hate? _ I hate that nobody ever thanks us for what we do.” She stared down sadly at the floor.

            This conversation, Reno decided, was becoming entirely too heavy. It was time to change the subject. “So, anyway, that blond grunt of yours – what’s his name?”

            “Cloud.”

            “Uh-huh? So. Cloud. You like him, don’t you?”__

            Her face grew hot. “No! He just – seems like a nice guy.”

            “You seemed to like him a lot in the helicopter.”

            “I was just talking to him. Passing the time.”

            “Uh-huh. So, who do you like, then? How about Rufus Shinra?  He’s your age. Bet you fancy him , don’t you?”

            “I never – “

            “Aw, come on. All the nice girls love Rufus.  Blue eyes, blond hair, cute bum, and all that gil - ”

             “No! He’s just a boy!”

            She was looking a little flustered. It was quite endearing.  Pleased with his handiwork, Reno pressed on: “Just a boy, eh? So you like someone older? Is it one of those guys on your LOVELESS posters?”

            “Stop it!”

            “Wait, I know - It’s Sephiroth, isn’t it?”

            “Now you’re just teasing me,” she said firmly, though her cheeks were still scarlet and she could not meet his eye. “I don’t like anybody. Really. Final word.”

            “C’mon, Veev, you can trust me. You know in your heart of hearts you want to tell.  It’s written all over your face. Come on. I can keep a secret.”

            “That’s not what Rosalind says. She warned me not to tell you anything that I didn’t want the whole of Shinra to know.”

            “Is that right?” he laughed, jumping to his feet. “I think I need a word with her. “  He grabbed Aviva’s wrist. “C’mon, witness, let’s go.”

_*_

_            From the pages of Aviva’s diary, 29th June 2001_

_            ZOMG!!!! That was a close one!!!!!!!!  I thought my heart would EXXXXPLOOOODE!!_

 

*

 

                  Night had fallen. Searchlights fingered the swollen bellies of the clouds that shrouded the Shinra Building. Tseng was standing by the window in Veld’s office, watching as the Commander paced back and forth, growling.

            “How did they know?” Veld demanded. “The mission was S-level classified. Not even Dr Rayleigh knew what was on the disk she was moving. How did AVALANCHE know we’d be making the transfer today? And where to intercept us?”

            Suddenly he stopped dead in his tracks. Throwing a quick look over his shoulder at the security camera, he gestured for Tseng to sit at the desk, and then sat himself down on the opposite side.  He took a notepad and a pencil and scribbled something, then turned the notepad onto its face and pushed it across the desktop to Tseng.

            Checking to make sure his head was blocking the security camera, Tseng picked up the notepad and read:

            _Someone high up inside Shinra is passing information to AVALANCHE._

            He nodded, wrote something, turned it over, pushed it back.

            Veld read:_ Yes. Who?_

            He wrote:_ Someone with access to S-level info. Suspects?_

            Tseng wrote: _The Board of Directors_

            Veld wrote: _And me. And you._

 


	4. Some Dreams Are Easier To Wake From Than Others

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Aviva makes a resolution, and Cissnei has some news for Reno

_ Page from Aviva’s diary, August 17th 2001 _

_…Last night I had the most terrible dream. I dreamed  that this is a dream, my life here with Shinra.  In my nightmare, I woke up back in my old room in Corel feeling so afraid, and I said, oh no, oh no, I’m not really a Turk, it was just a dream.  Then I heard a voice saying, no, this is the bad dream, and then I woke up for real all covered in sweat, and I realized I was still in Midgar in my own bed, in my own apartment, with Roz asleep in the apartment next to me and Mr Tseng in the apartment on the other side, and I thought THANK GOD, I’M SAFE. _

_            I try really hard not to, but sometimes I remember that stupid thing I did the day I started work here. The thought of it makes me go hot and cold all over. I was so scared. I was convinsed the Chief would realize what a big mistake he made hiring me - I was just waiting for him to come tell me I’d got it all wrong and was too cheap and stupid to be a Turk and he was going to send me back to Corel where I belonged. Probably it was a lucky thing Mr Tseng hadn’t given me my gun already because I was so desparate I think I might have shot myself.  And then I would have never known R,  and I’d have missed all this!_

_            The Chief was so kind. They were all so kind. I’d been expecting anything but kindness. No one’s ever mentioned it. It’s like some other person did it. Not me. The Chief said that was how it would be.  He said to me that I was in a new life now and I could let go of the old one.  And he said that he couldn’t promise I’d like everything he asked me to do, but that he could promise that I would always be valued. Isn’t that beautiful? I hope one day someone writes it on my tombstone._

_            I never want to let him down again, never, never, never…._

_*_

At the end of August Reno was surprised to get a telephone call from Cissnei. When he heard her voice on the other end of the line, his hands began to tremble.

            She said, “Are you busy? Can you meet me at the Goblins? I’m at the table in the corner.”

            “Are you OK?”

            “Yeah. Just come.”

            No prizes for guessing what this was about. He wanted to run to her. His heart was pounding as if he’d already run there and run back and run there again. But he didn’t want to rouse suspicion.  Rude was looking at him shrewdly behind those purple-tinted lenses.

            “Just going for a smoke,” he said, standing up.

            Cissnei was waiting for him at a table in the darkest part of the bar. “Your hair,” she said. “It’s like sending up a flare to announce your entrance.  Look, I got you a beer.”

            He sat down opposite her. “You haven’t called me for months. What’s wrong?”

            She was fiddling with the beer mat, would not meet his eye. “I’m going overseas. For quite a while. A year, maybe. On an extended assignment.”

            Had the Chief found out?  he wondered. Was this her punishment?  Aloud he said, “Overseas? Again? Where now?” working hard all the time to keep his face from giving anything away.

            “I’m sorry, Reno. I just can’t – I can’t tell you anything about it.”

            “Is it with Lazard? For SOLDIER?”           

            “That mission’s been compromised. The Chief’s pulled me.”

            It was as he’d thought, then.

            He managed a credible, “Why?”

            “Look – you might as well know….” She was bending the beer mat back and forth, breaking it slowly down the middle. “No, that’s not fair. I _want_ to tell you. Oh, let’s not pretend, Reno. I know you know about Zack and me. Don’t you?”

            He took a deep breath. “Yeah.”

            “Well, it’s all over. He’s dumped me.”

            She was so beautiful. So beautiful and desirable and hot. And the longing he’d had to smash Zack’s face in when she looked happy was like nothing compared to the urge he now felt to kill Zack for making her so sad.

            “You’re worth ten of her,” he said.

            Cissnei’s head jerked up. “Who?”

            “Well, that Ancient – “

            “Does _everyone_ know?”

            “Ciss – we all do surveillance duty.”

            Shreds of beer mat were scattered over the table. Cissnei hadn’t touched her drink.  She said angrily, “Who else knows about him and me?”

            “No one. Just Rude. I told him. I saw you at that party – that’s how I knew.”

            “I know. Zack told me he saw you there. That’s how I knew you knew. And also, because you stopped calling me.”

            She picked up another beer mat and began tearing it to pieces.  “It was that terrible day, the day you were trapped on the elevator. That’s when it started to go wrong.  He’d never seen me working anywhere but in the office before. I never… well, I never told him that I _wasn’t_ a Turk, but usually I didn’t wear the suit. Lazard likes women to wear dresses. And he never asked – “

            “You mean he didn’t know?”__

            Cissnei sighed. “Yeah, stupid me. How could I have thought he’d never find out? Anyway, that day…. The Chief sent me out to fight the crazy robots, but I can’t fight in a dress, so I went to our lockers and got changed and got my weapon.  I probably wasn’t thinking straight. I was so worried about you, you tit.  So then I went off after those one-winged things, remember? And then he showed up, and Tseng came, and you guys left, and… Oh God, his face. He said, _you’re a Turk?_ Like I’d told him I was a child molester or something.  And Tseng was looking at me – you know the way he does. So I thought, shit, cat’s out of the bag now. And then Tseng sent me off to deal with the Genesis copies, and Zack followed me, and… I don’t know, Reno.  I think I must be the dumbest bitch alive. I was attacked by one of the clones and he tried to help me and I said “No!” because I wanted to show off. _Show off. _That I can fight as good as he can. I must need my fucking head examined. Then we had some asinine conversation about wings and freedom and how the clones weren’t monsters.”  Cissnei sighed.  “And then he has to go falling out of Reactor Five right into her flower bed. So up there,” she flicked a hand, “We have a bloodstained monster-killing Turk in a suit, and down here, a beautiful shining angel in a frilly dress. So that was it for me.”

            “Ciss, don’t do this to yourself.”

            “Don’t get me wrong,” she said. “He wasn’t – unkind. I mean, the sex was good. I think he’ll miss that.  And to be fair, he was honest about it. He said he couldn’t be with me any more because of his feelings for her. Of course like an idiot I said, _what does she make you feel that I don’t? _And he said, _when I’m with you I feel like a boy, but when I’m with her I feel like a man. _I guess I deserved that.”

            “But she’s just a kid.”

            She looked at him wildly. “Have they - ?”

            “Not as far as I know. It would be in the reports.”

            “The reports.” She shuddered. “Every word. Every step. Every kiss. I never understood before how awful it must be. To have somebody watching everything you do. Reno, you wouldn’t….? No, no,” she shook her head with a grimace of disgust. “It’s just a matter of time anyway. He’s crazy about her, and he – he’s so _driven_.  I never told him about her. I mean, that she’s an Ancient. Does he know? Does he know she’s being watched?”

            “You’ve been out of the office a while, haven’t you? You should give us more credit.”

            “You’re right,” she said, her mouth beginning to tremble again. “I’m sorry. I feel like such a failure. And I’ve wrecked the goddamned mission too, and the Chief is so pissed with me. It’s like I can’t do anything right. And Aerith can do no wrong. Aerith doesn’t compete with him.  Aerith is _afraid _of monsters. Aerith feels so safe when he’s around.  Aerith doesn’t swear or drink or get blood on her face when she kills people. She’s kind of a nice girl that way.”

            “For fuck’s sake, Ciss, it’s not like Zack teaches nursery school for a living.”

            Cissnei gasped, and all of a sudden she was laughing in an astonished kind of way, laughing and crying and rubbing her face with her hands, smearing the tears everywhere.  Her eyes were red and her nose was running and she _still _looked gorgeous.  He wished he had a handkerchief to give her. Mozo and Rude would not have been so badly equipped. So he stood up and offered the only thing he had – the tail of his shirt.  She stared at him, really focusing on his face for the first time that night, and snorted with laughter.

            “Oh, Reno, how I do so fucking love you. I’m not going to blow my snot all over your dirty shirt, so sit down.”

            “I’ll get some toilet paper,” he said.

            All the way to the bathroom, and all the way back, he was warning himself, _whatever you do, don’t say it. Because she doesn’t want to hear it. All she wants is a shoulder to cry on._

            When he came back, she had managed to pull herself together a little, and was tidying her hair with a comb. He gave her the wad of paper. She dipped it into the beer, to dampen it, and while she cleaned her face all he could think of was licking those tearstains from her salty cheeks and kissing those red swollen lips –

            “Zack’s crazy,” he blurted, “You are the hottest thing in Midgar.”

            He heard himself saying this, and the sane part of his mind shouted _You idiot!_

She batted her eyelids at him. “You sure know how to cheer a girl up.”

            Did she think he didn’t mean it? Then he might yet cover up his clumsy confession. He could turn it into a joke, make her laugh.

            But his big mouth wanted its own way and it said, “No. Seriously.”

            She saw that he did mean it. He watched the realisation take hold of her: first surprise, then alarm, then dismay. Her look became guarded; she folded her arms over her chest, pulled herself in like a wary animal crouching down in the grass. He could have kicked himself.

            “No,” he said; and then, accepting that the damage was done and it was useless to backpedal any longer: “All right, yes. Sort of.”

            She put her hand over her mouth and stared at him, round-eyed. Almost anything would have been better than that look – a box on the ears, a kick in the teeth, a knife through the heart.

            In a voice barely more than a whisper, she said, “What do you take me for?”

            What kind of question was that? How was he supposed to answer it? “Nothing – I mean – I just had to say it, Ciss – “ He reached out a hand to her.

            “Don’t touch me,” she spat, recoiling. “Do you think I’m desperate?”

            _ Ouch_. Low blow. “No – I just meant – “

            “What’s wrong with you?” She wasn’t whispering now.  “I’ve just lost the love of my life and I’m sitting here pouring my soul out to someone I thought was my best friend, only to discover that the whole time all he’s been thinking of is how long it’ll take him to get into my knickers.”

            “That’s not true. I – “

            “I should have known better. Everything’s just one big joke to you, isn’t it? No - don’t talk to me. Don’t you fucking speak another word.” She stood up forcefully.  “I’m leaving.”  He pushed his chair back to go after her, but she whirled round, turning on him a face as savage as a wounded cuahl. “Don’t you follow me. Keep away from me. I’m warning you. At this precise moment I feel like the thing I want most in the world is to kill somebody, and right now you are at the top of my list, you false friend, you – you - stupid - _prick_.”

            He let her go.  Or no, that wasn’t quite true.  All the rest of that day and the days that followed, as he played the scene over and over again in his head, he saw himself standing there, helplessly watching while she elbowed her way through the crowded bar, and all the time, even after she was gone, and for days and weeks thereafter, he was waiting for the right words to come to him, the ones that would put everything right, turn everything around.  But the end was always the same. Cissnei was gone. He had blown it.

 

 


	5. By Helicopter to Modeoheim

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Tseng reflects on Zack, Angeal, and certain necessary tasks, and we learn the truth about his relationship with Aerith

            Veld thought, and Tseng agreed with him, that Zack Fair’s relationship with Aerith Gainsborough did not pose any immediate danger to the company. His relationship with Angeal Hewley, however, was another matter.

            Though publicly pronounced killed in action, Angeal was still very much alive. The Board knew this. The Turks knew it. Sephiroth and Lazard knew it. Even the fanclub girls suspected something. And Zack knew it. He had seen Angeal with his own eyes, and his conscience was troubled.

            To Tseng’s mind, the Science Department was barking up the wrong tree with their research into Ancients and Jenova Cells and clones and superwarriors.  What they really needed to invent was a drug to silence that small inner voice whispering the knowledge of good and evil. Training could only do so much.  Alcohol, tobacco, materia, drugs, sex: all were tried, in various combinations. None were permanent solutions.

            Zack believed Angeal had the answers. In reality, though, Angeal was part of the problem – perhaps, thought Tseng, the most dangerous part. The Second and Third classes had never loved Genesis. They did not really love Sephiroth, that coldly remote and lonely figure, and they did not really want to be like him, though they went in awe of him. But they loved Angeal, because he had loved them, and they wanted to be Angeal, because he had given so much of himself to them.  To put it another way, none of them would have been entirely surprised to learn that Genesis was a monster in disguise; a monster of vanity, one might say. But Angeal? Easier to believe that they themselves were the monsters...

            Tseng’s necessarily pragmatic view of Zack Fair – namely, that he was to be encouraged and protected as long as he was of service to the company and liquidated if he became a threat – was tempered by a degree of fellow feeling. Like Zack, he knew how it felt to have been singled out for favour: for harder training, more punishing missions, greater demands, and no excuses.  He too had been lucky enough to have as a mentor a man he could admire and seek to emulate: a man with clear principles and strength of character; a man who excelled at his work. A decent human being. Such men were rare in Shinra. Or, indeed, anywhere.

            According to Cissnei, Zack believed that Angeal intended to return to SOLDIER once the crisis with Genesis had been resolved. She said Angeal had told Zack so himself. This was one of the few useful pieces of information to have emerged from the debacle of her mission to SOLDIER. Tseng wondered, though, whether Angeal could really be so naïve. He bore upon his body the outward manifestation of the secret experiment that had made him; this manifestation, the wing, could not be hidden or removed. According to Hojo, to whom Veld had gone for advice, if the wing was amputated it would regrow.  Angeal must know that Shinra would never allow their SOLDIERs to see this. It was bad enough that Zack had seen it, that single great white wing like a swan’s wing unfurling from Angeal’s shoulderblade. Anyone who saw it would be forced to start asking themselves questions about how Angeal had got that way, and what exactly Shinra had done to him; and from there it was only a small step to wonder, _What is Shinra doing to us? To me?_

            Angeal would have to be eliminated.  Tseng had been ordered to do it.  Angeal trusted nobody but Zack, and therefore Tseng would have to use Zack to get close enough to Angeal to kill him.  Zack could not be told, of course; he must think that they were on a mission to find the home base of the Genesis copies. Tseng intended to fulfil his mission quickly, out of respect for what remained of Angeal’s humanity. If at all possible he hoped to avoid, for Aerith sake, for Shinra’s sake, the need to kill Zack too.

            They would go by helicopter to Modeoheim.

 

*

 

            Zack was not in the building, but Tseng could guess where he had gone. He told the helicopter pilot to put him down at the Church. Sure enough, he hadn’t been waiting many minutes before Zack showed up, running at the double from the Sector Five Market.

            “Let’s go,” said Tseng. “I need you in Modeoheim.”

            Zack pushed past him, making for the church door. “I know. Just give me a minute.”

            “Aerith isn’t there.”

            That brought him up sharply. He folded his arms and gave Tseng a long look. Probably he thought he looked intimidating.

            “Problem?” asked Tseng.

            “How is it that you know Aerith?”

            “It’s…. complicated.”

            For if he were to tell the Zack the whole story – which he had no intention of doing, ever – he would have to go back to the very beginning….           

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

            Tseng had been, by Veld’s reckoning, perhaps nine years old when Aerith came into his life. He had been living in the Shinra building for as long as he could remember, a polite little savage in a school uniform, a wild thing tamed to no hand but the Commander’s and already steeped in the ways of secretiveness. The cafeteria ladies and the receptionists at the front desk had long given up trying to tease a smile from the boy. Tseng’s smile was the baring of teeth.

            He slept in a corner of Veld’s back office, took his showers in the staff lockers,  ate his meals in the canteen…. Not a normal life for a child, by any stretch of the imagination. Not the kind of upbringing that Zack, with his mom and pop back on the family farm, would understand. But Tseng could imagine no other; nor would he have wished for a normal childhood even if he’d known what it was.  A life without the Commander did not bear thinking of.

            _It’s complicated…. _

Because everything connected with Commander Veld was complicated. A spider’s-web of connections; labyrinthine intricacies. And there was an irony in that, when one considered that Veld was a man who had striven to simplify his life by dividing it into compartments: Midgar; Kalm. Shinra; family. Love; duty.

_            Where do I fit in? _the child Tseng had often wondered.__

            He had never met Mrs Veld or the girl Felicia, or seen a photograph of them. Veld’s desk and his walls were bare.  As an adult Tseng could look back and wonder about this. Knox, the only other family man whom he knew at all well, put pictures of his children up everywhere.  Veld never spoke of his family, not when he had them, and not after he lost them. Had he ever mentioned to his wife and daughter that he was raising in his office in Midgar a boy whom he’d picked up off the streets? The answer, Tseng guessed, was probably no. 

            _A man’s loved ones are his hostages to fortune. _That was what Veld used to say, when discussing the best way to put pressure on someone.  So perhaps the reason he had kept his family private – fenced them in, boxed them in, no trespassing – was to keep them safe. If nobody knew what his wife and child looked like, they could not be easily targeted or kidnapped. As far as Tseng had been able to discover, no one in Shinra had ever been invited to Veld’s home in Kalm, old Kalm, Kalm before the firestorm.  Not even Reeve Tuesti, or that comrade of Veld’s youth, Vincent Valentine, whose battered and faded ID card Tseng had found years ago in the archives. _Dead now, long dead_, the Commander had said, putting the card into his breast pocket. __

            Thus, the first time Tseng met Aerith and her mother, he jumped immediately to the conclusion that they were Mrs Veld and Felicia, even though he knew that Felicia was not a baby. He knew this because he had once, just once, happened to overhear the Commander on the phone to his wife, and mention had been made of Felicia’s twelfth birthday.  But Tseng’s jealousy was stronger than his reason.

            He had come home from school that day with the usual bruises and scrapes, same old story; he did not complain, and the Commander only said “I hope the other fellow looks worse”, and since the other fellow did indeed look worse (had lost two teeth, in fact) Tseng nodded, and the Commander ruffled his hair and said, “Come along with me, there’s someone I want you to meet.”

            In those days the Shinra building was still in the process of being constructed; the President’s office and the boardroom were on the twenty-second floor, and the Department of Administrative Research was on the twenty-third. Together Tseng and the Commander rode the elevator up to the twenty-eighth floor, where Tseng had thought there was nothing but store-rooms.  Stepping out of the elevator, he saw three infantrymen standing guard outside a door. The Commander knocked, and the door was opened by a slight, brown-haired woman holding a tiny baby in her arms.

            _It’s them_, thought Tseng.

            The woman ushered them inside, and the Commander told him to sit. The sofa was Shinra blue, like the banquettes in the rest areas, and the floor tiles were standard Shinra issue. _This apartment was a storeroom_, Tseng realized, _and it’s been fixed up for them. Fixed up in a hurry. _

On the windowsill stood a row of potted plants – herbs of some kind. Tseng knew they were real and not plastic because he could smell them.

             “Coffee?” asked the woman. “Tea for us both,” said the Commander, “With milk and sugar.”

            The woman said to Tseng, “Hold Aerith for me,” and put the baby in his arms.

            Her name was Aerith? Not Felicia?  Relief, sudden and complete, washed over him.  Of course! Felicia was a big girl.  This wasn’t the Commander’s family; that woman wasn’t Mrs Veld.  How could he have been so stupid? Allowing his feelings to get the upper hand, making unfounded assumptions: these were bad habits, and the Commander would give him a good clip round the ear, or worse, if he knew what Tseng had been thinking.  

            But he didn’t know, so everything was all right. Tseng could relax. He didn’t have to be afraid, not right now. He didn’t have to brace himself for the worst. He could even let his guard down a little, and take a look at this strange object, this baby, this hot little squirming bundle that had been dumped unceremoniously in the clumsy crook of his elbow.

            Tseng had never held a baby before. He had never _seen_ a baby before, not up close. Somehow he’d imagined it would be bigger. This baby’s whole head fit into the cup of his hand.  He could enclose her tiny fist in his. A strong pulse could be seen beating under the skin at the top of her skull, and over it her dark hair was fine as thistledown. How could something so small be so complete in every detail? Intricate ears – thick eyelashes – sharp pink nails. He turned over one of her hands to look closely at the pads of her fingers, marveling  at the minute, clearly-etched, whorling fingerprints.

            The baby’s hand closed round his thumb and held on tight.

            He whispered to the Commander, “She has such old eyes.”

            “All babies look like that,” Veld replied softly. “As if they’re born knowing everything. And then, we forget.”

            Tseng’s mouth twitched in an attempt at a smile.

            Aerith smiled back, gummy, delighted, and fearless, and Tseng’s heart gave a painful lurch, as if it had suddenly grown too big for the cage of its ribs.

            “She seems to have taken a shine to you,” said the Commander, putting his hand on Tseng’s shoulder.

            The woman was still busy in the kitchen. “Who are they?” Tseng asked in an undertone.

            “The woman is Mrs Gast. Ifalna Gast. Aerith is her daughter. She’s about two months old.”

            “What are they doing here?”

            At that moment the woman returned with a tray of tea, and so the Commander never answered Tseng’s question.  Hearing her mother’s voice, the baby began to fuss. Tseng felt alarmed, thinking he had mishandled her in some way.

            “It’s all right,” said Mrs Gast. “She’s just hungry. Give her to me.”

            Mrs Gast unbuttoned her blouse and put the baby to suck on her breast.  Deeply embarrassed, Tseng’s face reddened; he shifted uneasily in his seat.  Seeing his discomfort, Mrs Gast said, “You can turn on the television if you like.”

            The television was on the other side of the room. Tseng found a children’s cartoon. He pitched the sound at a volume loud enough to deceive the adults, but low enough to enable him to eavesdrop, then settled himself on the floor and pretended to be absorbed by the show.

            As he expected, it wasn’t long before the adults began to talk about him.  Mrs Gast was curious. Strangers always were.  She wanted to know where Tseng lived (on the executive floor, the twenty-first:  he had a bed and a cupboard all to himself behind a row of filing cabinets. He had his own keycard, too, and he had never once lost it). But then where, she asked, did he go to school? (Midgar Junior Military Academy, Sector Seven. Motto: survival of the fittest.)

            She said, “So do you mean to make a Turk of him, Piet?”

            “He’s bright,” said the Commander. “He has potential. And he’s tough, my God.”

            “He would need to be,” said Mrs Gast. “It can’t be easy for him.”

            Tseng knew exactly what she was referring to. Though he tried his best to avoid ever catching sight of his own reflection, occasionally he fell victim to an ambush, his features leaping out at him from a lamplit windowpane, or someone’s mirrored sunglasses, to take him by surprise with a forcible reminder that he looked nothing like the Commander – or anyone else in Shinra, for that matter.

            Everything about his appearance was alien, wrong. The white skin - the high cheekbones - the slanted black eyes and the delicate mouth - the silky dark hair growing back from a widow’s peak, all suggested allegiances Tseng did not feel, a language he could not speak, a history he wanted no part of.

            “What happened to his parents?” asked Mrs Gast.

            Veld shrugged.

             “How did he end up in Midgar?”

            “I don’t know,” said Veld, in a tone that meant, _does it matter?_

            “And this?” she asked. From the corner of his eye Tseng could see Mrs Gast pointing at her own forehead.

            “A tattoo?” suggested Veld. “I don’t know its significance.

 Tseng didn't know either. All he knew was that no amount of scrubbing could remove it. It seemed to be made of indelible ink, pressed into his skin by someone’s smudgey little finger. Whose? The woman who bore him? And why? To mark him? To claim him? No – he refused to be claimed. At school they accused him of being from Wutai but it was not true. He was from Midgar. Shinra was his home. He belonged to the Commander.

            “When I found him,” said Veld, “All he knew was his name. He was living rough on the streets.”

            How old had he been? Four, perhaps. That was the Commander’s guess. There was no way of knowing for sure.

            Mrs Gast said softly, “And he is only one of so many. Poor boy.”

             “He doesn’t need your pity, Ifalna.”

            “Then what does he need? Why have you brought him here, Piet?”

            At this point both the adults suddenly realized that the object of their discussion was listening intently. The Commander therefore leaned forward to whisper his answer in Mrs Gast’s ear.  She gazed meditatively into space; then her eyes came to rest on Tseng for a moment, before looking down at her daughter. Aerith had fallen asleep at her mother’s breast.  Mrs Gast laid the baby on her lap and made herself decent, buttoning the blouse with one hand.

            “It’s time for Aerith’s nap,” she said. “You’d better go. But come again – come and see us, Tseng, whenever you like.”

            He did not believe she meant it. Most grown-ups, with the exception of the Commander and his men, said things they did not mean and made promises they had no intention of keeping. And when had he, Tseng, with his alien face, ever been welcomed anywhere, except among Veld’s Turks? They were his friends. They understood him, just as they understood a lot of other things without needing to be told. The Turks didn’t try to play with him. They didn’t waste his time telling him stupid jokes and then looking annoyed when he failed to laugh. They didn’t even deliberately try to teach him anything.  They simply let him be. When he came into their office (_hey there, squirt)_, they allowed him to sit beside their desks and watch what they were doing. It might be hacking into a website, or priming a bomb’s timer. If he asked, they let him try it for himself. They didn’t criticize him when he failed or praise him when he succeeded.  A quiet, “You’re all right,” was as much as they would offer. If one of them was going to the shooting range or the gym, Tseng was invited along (_wanna come, kid?)_, and if Tseng felt like watching, he could watch. If he felt like shooting or punching, the Turk would show him how to do it, and then leave him alone.

            In those days, Knox and Natalya were the rookies.

            Sometimes one of the Commander’s Turks failed to come back from a mission. Then they would drink even more than they normally did (the crate of empties in the kitchen was always full) and talk more and laugh more loudly for a day or two.  Tseng realized it was important not to allow himself to get too attached to any of them.  One hostage to fortune was enough.

            So it wasn’t that Tseng was lonely, exactly. All the same, there came a day, a week or two after he first met Aerith, when the Commander was away on business, and all the Turks were out on missions, and he had finished his homework, when he began to think about the baby and feel that he would like to hold her again.  So he got in the elevator and rode up to the 28th floor, and knocked shyly, and Mrs Gast smiled when she saw him and said, “I’m glad you came. Aerith’s just woken up. We’re going to have supper. Do you want to join us? Why don’t you take her while I set the table?”

            He held Aerith up against his shoulder, supporting her head with one hand as Mrs Gast had showed him. Her warm breath tickled his neck. He breathed deeply, inhaling her scent.

            “She smells spicey,” he observed.

            He thought she smelled marvelous, heavenly, but he was careful to keep emotion out of his voice.

            “I know,” said Mrs Gast. “Like gingerbread. Aren’t babies wonderful?”

            She served him a casserole made of cheese, vegetables, and noodles, more delicious than anything he had ever tasted. Afterwards, he helped clear the table without being asked, and dried the dishes while she washed.  When everything was tidied away, she let him sit cross-legged on the sofa and hold the sleeping baby, while she sat in the armchair under the blue light, knitting a tiny sweater and telling him legends from the days when the planet was young. The magic of her words brought the past to life in his imagination; it was almost as if she’d been there, seen the events she was describing with her own eyes. 

            Never in all the cold hard world, which was all he knew, had he imagined a peace like the peace he found there, that night, in Mrs Gast’s apartment. He wished the evening could go on forever: Mrs Gast weaving her spells in the low lamplight, the good food warm in his belly, Aerith sleeping against his chest, her breath soft and regular, his own eyelids drooping…

            A cool hand on his forehead woke Tseng up. Mrs Gast was stroking the hair back from his brow.  “Time to go to bed, little one,” she said. “Come again tomorrow.”

            Over the weeks and months that followed, Ifalna Gast, with her cooking and her gentleness, tamed Piet Veld’s fierce orphan.  Looking back, the adult Tseng often wondered if this was what the Commander had whispered into her ear the day they first met. _What the boy needs is a mother_. Or perhaps it was simply this: _he needs something soft to love. _

            Mrs Gast was very different from the Commander. She never raised her voice; she never grew impatient or struck Aerith.  Yet in some ways, it seemed to Tseng, they were alike.  She was small, and Veld was tall, but they had the same strong physical presence.  She was comfortable with silences. When Tseng asked her a question, she gave it careful consideration before she answered. She did not lie or make false promises. And when she looked at Tseng with those reddish-brown eyes, those earth-coloured eyes of hers, he felt that she saw through to his core just as the Commander did – that she knew everything about him, and mostly approved of what she saw, though there was always room for improvement.

            Tseng would willingly have lain down his life for either of them. He loved them unreservedly, without any expectation of return. He knew perfectly well that Mrs Gast was not his mother, just as Commander Veld was not really his father; indeed, he would never allow himself to forget this. If they were good to him, it was because goodness was their nature.  They saw something in him worth their trouble.

            But he did think that Aerith loved him, a little.

            He held her hand when she learned to walk. He picked her up when she fell down. He taught her to throw and catch a ball. He gave her piggyback rides. He drew pictures of monsters for her to colour, and cartoons of stick men riding stick chocobos. Sometimes Mrs. Gast let him take Aerith out of the suite. They went to the cafeteria for ice cream, then rode up and down the elevators together, Aerith sitting on his hip to press all the buttons. 

            Mrs. Gast herself did not leave the apartment.

            How and when did he learn that Aerith’s father was dead? As a grown man, he couldn’t recall. Did the Commander tell him? Or was it simply the only conclusion to be drawn from the fact of Mr. Gast’s non-existence? Who Mr. Gast was, or had been, Tseng didn’t know and didn’t think to ask.

            Three armed infantrymen were always on duty outside Mrs. Gast’s door, but never the same ones for more than a month or two. Were they guarding her, or protecting her?  Tseng never asked about this either; yet, looking back, it seemed to him he must have known, even when he was ten or eleven years old, that she was a prisoner - or if not a prisoner, then something similar: someone whose importance had cost her her freedom. Yet she seemed content. Happy, even.

 

*

 

            When Tseng was thirteen years old, the Commander’s wife and daughter died.

            Tseng would never have known if Natalya hadn’t told him. She took him aside and whispered the news. “How?” he asked. She said their house had caught fire. The Commander had lost an arm trying to save them.  

            (It was only years later, when he was a fully-fledged Turk, that Tseng learned the truth.  Kalm had been burnt to the ground by Shinra, on Veld’s orders. Veld had meant to order the bombing of an illegal arms cache fifty kilometers east of Kalm, but the coordinates had become garbled in transmission. Hundreds of innocent people had died as a result. Knowing Veld as well as he did, the adult Tseng understood that there was a sense in which his guilt had helped him to bear his grief, and his grief had enabled him to transcend the guilt: the death of his family was the punishment for his mistake. Yes, a complicated man.)

            The Commander was gone for a month. When he came back, wearing a prosthetic arm, he looked ten years older. Grey streaked his hair. He sat at his desk with his shoulders hunched, grimly ploughing through the paperwork that had piled up in his absence, while the Turks came and went on their soft-soled shoes, asking short questions to which they received short answers. They understood what Tseng was also in time to learn, that work is the best cure for sorrow. To the thirteen year old boy, though, the silence felt absolute.  He was afraid it might be like this forever. How could he break it? What could he say?

            _I’m sorry your wife and daughter are dead._

But was he?

            _Are you angry with me for being alive? Do you wish it was me who had died?_

For almost a year Tseng had kept out of trouble at school – or perhaps it would be truer to say that trouble had steered well clear of him. The other boys, having learnt to fear him, gave him a wide berth. But on the day after the Commander came back to Midgar, he exploded.  What the trigger was, he never could say. A word in the wrong place? A squint of the eyes? Did he even need a reason? The pleasure was all that mattered: the joy of kicking his enemy’s legs neatly out from under him, executing to perfection the maneuver he had learnt from Knox in the gym; the satisfaction of pinning his enemy to the floor by kneeling on the softest part of the upper arms and then grinding his knees until he could feel the hardness of bone inside flesh. Grabbing a handful of his enemy’s hair, Tseng smashed the boy’s head against the floor. Once he started, he couldn’t stop; slam, slam, slam, though he could hear the bone cracking, could taste the flecks of blood that spattered his lips. The boy’s head had become the Commander’s grief, and Tseng was pummeling it into oblivion: screams were what was needed to break the silence.

            It took four teachers to peel Tseng from his unconscious victim. “Holy shit,” exclaimed one, “The gook’s killed him!” which was going too far, even for the Junior Military Academy.  Tseng was hauled to the Principal’s office, and Veld was summoned.

When he arrived, the first thing the Commander did was order the Principal to leave the room. Once they were alone, he turned to Tseng, who was standing at attention in the center of the carpet, and simply looked at him, his expression unreadable, for a long time.            

            Then he said, “I thought you’d grown out of this kind of thing.”

            Tseng had expected to get the buckle end of Veld’s belt. He could have borne that, because he deserved it. But this – to see the Commander looking so tired, to hear him sounding so flat, unable to summon the energy to punish a miscreant; unable, perhaps, to care – this hurt more than anything.

            Veld went on, “Your teachers say it was an unprovoked attack.”

Tseng hung his head. “I’m sorry, sir.”

            Veld lowered himself into the Principal’s chair. For a few moments he merely sat there, elbows braced on knees, resting his forehead against his knuckles.  Then he began to speak. “Listen, my boy. I’m not going to lie to you. I’ve hurt people.  As you know. Sometimes I’ve hurt innocent people.  I’m not proud of that, but I’m not ashamed of it either. I do what’s necessary.  It’s my job. I don’t do it for fun.  What I want you to understand is that when you start to enjoy someone else’s pain, then you’ve crossed the line.  There’s enough monsters in Midgar already.  We need to remember we’re men. Look, why don’t you sit down?”

            Veld gestured at a chair with his prosthesis. For a moment Tseng felt sick. He had been avoiding the sight of that arm. It was, to be sure, a splendid example of Shinra technology. Spliced to the raw ends of Veld’s living nerves, the fingers moved almost like real fingers. There was a materia slot in the wrist. The silicon skin was life-coloured, thought its texture was rubbery, poreless, and cold. It looked real, but it wasn’t real. It was second best. A fake arm could never be a real arm. It could never replace flesh and blood.

            Seeing the look on Tseng’s face, Veld lifted the prosthetic arm and stretched its hand out towards the boy. “Does this bother you? Get over it, my boy. I like my new arm. In some ways it’s better than the old one.  And it….” He hesitated. A spasm of pain contorted his features.

            “It hurts,” said Tseng.

            The Commander nodded. “Yes. A lot. But it’s all right. It’ll get better. Don’t be afraid of pain, Tseng. If we couldn’t feel pain, how would we know we were alive? And this arm… it’s heavier than my old one. Feels like a damn dead weight, sometimes. But it helps to remind me how much of me is still human. Now, go clean out your locker and we’ll go home.”

            Tseng’s victim did not die, though it was touch and go for a while. The payment of an undisclosed sum of money, combined with Veld’s position in Shinra and the fear inspired by the Turks, persuaded the boys’ parents to drop the lawsuit they had been contemplating, and so that particular trouble was averted. The Junior Military Academy expelled Tseng nevertheless, a consummation they had long desired. His departure brought the percentage of Wuteng in that elite school down to zero.

            “Looks like you’ve completed your education,” said the Commander. “So you might as well get to work.”

            A suit was made for him, a tie purchased in the company store.  For the first time in his life Tseng liked what he saw in the mirror.  He went to show himself off to Mrs Gast and Aerith.  Aerith was charmed by the tie and immediately climbed into his lap to try to undo the knot. Mrs Gast looked long and hard into his face, until he felt uncomfortable and had to turn away.

            “You’re so young,” she said. “Is this really what you want?”

            “It’s what I’ve always wanted,” he replied.

             The first living thing he killed was a Chuse Tank. Down in the sewers beneath Sector 8, he took it out with a single clean shot through the eye, and he was so proud he dragged it all the way back to the office to show to the others, who clapped him on the back and suggested having it stuffed.

            Aerith wanted to see it, too. He asked Mrs Gast if he could show it to her. She replied, “I’m sorry, Tseng, but no.”

            Her coolness, her lack of enthusiasm, hurt him deeply. Clearly she was in some obscure way disappointed in him, but why? She had always known he was destined to be a Turk. It was the one of the first things the Commander had told her.  Among the ignorant masses the Turks had a bad reputation; he knew that. He had assumed Mrs Gast was not ignorant, that she realized the Turks were essentially practical people who did difficult, necessary things, getting their hands dirty so that others would not need to. No Turk expected gratitude. Yet he had truly believed Mrs Gast would understand and be glad for him, knowing him as she did and having been his friend for so long.

            But then, how well could one person ever know another, really?

            Now that Tseng was in the office during working hours, he was coming to realize there were many things he did not know about Mrs Gast.  For example, he had never known that the Commander also paid regular visits to her apartment, which, now that the building had been completed, had been moved to the 63rd floor. One day during his lunch break Tseng went up to give Aerith a purple lollipop he’d bought while patrolling Loveless Avenue, only to find the Commander ensconced on the sofa, balancing a delicate china cup on his blue serge knee.  “Come in,” Veld and Mrs Gast said together, apparently pleased to see him. For one awful moment he wondered if he had surprised them in some kind of old folks’ romantic assignation (he was at the age when such images easily sprang to mind)  - but there was Mrs Gast, sitting up at the table, and the Commander on the sofa, and Aerith playing on the floor between them, and the whole atmosphere was one of easy friendliness.  Tseng took a cup of tea and sat down on the carpet beside Aerith, helping her to build a castle out of bricks while the adults resumed their conversation.

            They were discussing the possibility of war with Wutai. That backward kingdom, all that remained of the world outside Shinra’s empire, was rich in mako, but refused to accept the necessity of reactors on its sovereign soil.

            “And what about you, Tseng?” asked Mrs Gast. “How would you feel if there was a war against Wutai?”

            He threw up his head and glared at her fiercely. “I’m Shinra.”

            Again the sad smile, the shadow of disappointment in her eyes.  “I know that,” she said.

            She turned back to Veld. “More war. Always war. Brother against brother.”

            “If this war happens,” said the Commander, “We’ll win, and that’ll be it. There will be no more wars after.”

            “I think you really believe that. But this is too harsh a world you’ve made, Piet – you, and Shinra, and Heidegger, and the others.”

            The Commander said, “It was worse before.”

        _There’s so much I don’t know_, thought Tseng.           

            That evening, when they were eating supper together in the staff canteen, Tseng said to Veld, “Tell me about before, sir.”

            “Before what?”

            “Before Shinra.”

            So Veld told him, and it was pretty much what he had learned in school. Centuries of warfare – the Great Continental War, the Gi Invasions, the Mideelian War of the Funeral Urn, the Grasslands Nomads’ War, the Fifteen Years’ War, the Wars of the Three Queens… The history of their world had been one long struggle for power and control of resources, which had only ended when a small arms manufacturer, grown rich on the wars of others, had discovered a way of providing seemingly inexhaustible energy for all.  You could call it empire building, or you could call it imposing peace. Either way, the weary world had been mostly glad to see Shinra take control. As the Commander had said to Mrs Gast, it had been worse before.

            Then the Director pushed aside their plates, and taking hold of Tseng’s wrists, leaned forward. Looking around to make sure there was nobody within earshot, he said in a low, forceful voice, “Listen. You’re old enough now to know. What I’m about to tell you are company secrets. You don’t talk about them with anybody outside the Turks. You understand?”

            Heart beating fast, Tseng nodded.

            Then the Director told him the things they didn’t teach in school.

            Mako energy was a finite resource. One day it would run out.

            Mako extraction killed the soil around the reactors.  And the dead zones were spreading.

            Reactor activity bred monsters. Midgar had so many monsters because it had so many reactors.

            Shinra scientists did not know the answers to these problems. But there was somebody who might.

            Humans brings were not the only intelligent life form on the planet. Once there had been another race, an ancient race possessed of a wealth of knowledge about the planet. They were a long-lived people, but not vigorous, and several thousand years ago an unknown calamity had befallen them, possibly a disease of some sort, which had reduced their numbers below what a species needed to survive. Over the centuries they had continued to die out. Mrs Gast was the last one left. To safeguard her, Shinra had taken her into protective custody.

            “You see, Tseng, Mrs Gast – Ifalna – knows something that could be of vital importance for our future. Her people called it the Promised Land. It’s a source of unlimited mako that won’t drain the planet. If she would tell us where it is, all the world’s problems could be solved.”

            Tseng’s mind was reeling. He couldn’t take everything in. One point stood out for him. “Do you mean, sir, that Aerith’s mother…. That she’s not - a human being?”

            “That’s a good question. I’m no scientist, but obviously she has to be human enough to have had a child with Gast.  I suppose the answer is that she’s partly human. Or maybe she’s a different kind of human.  She’s certainly much older than she looks. She knows so much about this planet. If only we could get her to talk.”

            “But Aerith?” said Tseng. “What about Aerith?”

            “If Ifalna were to confide what she knows to anyone, it would be her daughter. And her husband. I’ve always regretted his death.”

            “_You_ killed him?” exclaimed Tseng.

            “No. Professor Hojo killed him. But I led Hojo to them. Faremis Gast used to run the Science Department. Hojo was one of his subordinates. Gast was working with Ifalna, trying to get her to share her knowledge. Then they fell in love. The thing is, Tseng, we’re not unreasonable. They could have lived here together and continued to work together and everybody would have been happy. But they were seduced by the illusion of freedom. They ran away.  My orders were to bring them back.  It took me two years to track them down. Eventually I found them at Icicle Inn.  They’d had to stop running. Aerith had just been born.”

            “I offered them the chance to return together. We needed them both. But they refused.  I hadn’t realized I was being followed, so I left them to think it over. After I left, Hojo showed up with some of Heidgger’s men and ordered them to shoot Faremis. He said the Gasts were trying to escape.  He was lying, of course. He had his own reasons for not wanting to see his old boss come back.  But I want us to be absolutely clear about this, Tseng.  I liked Faremis, but if I’d had to kill him in order to secure Ifalna, I would have done it.  She’s too valuable to lose.”

            “But – “ Tseng stammered, “I don’t understand. You seem – like friends – “

            “She neither blames me nor forgives me,” the Director replied. “That probably makes no sense to you. But you can see why she doesn’t trust me. Or Shinra. She never has. And I don’t blame her either. Personal feelings don’t come into it. She has information that we need. We have to convince her to share it with us, for her own sake as much as anyone else’s.  And by we I mean you and me. The President is growing impatient. There is a limit to how long he will wait before he decides to turn them both over to Hojo, who has his own ways of getting what he wants out of people. You know what I mean.”

            Tseng did know: he had heard the stories. He had seen the victims of the failed experiments, carried out under white sheets to be disposed of in the incinerators. It would be better to die than to fall into Hojo’s hands.

            “No,” he said, “Not Aerith.”

            “You’re very fond of that little girl, aren’t you? And she adores you. You’ve done well there, Tseng.  I think Ifalna trusts you. I know she likes you. Build on that. Don’t tackle her head on, don’t ask her to tell. That’ll shut her down more surely than anything, because she’ll know it comes from me.  Go on being what you’ve always been to them. Eventually, god willing, she’ll see sense.”

            But Tseng could not bring himself to do it. He was afraid to go and see them now. How could he look Mrs Gast in the eyes and pretend to be innocent of the things the Commander had told him? What did it mean, anyway, to be a ‘different kind of human’? Was Aerith different too? Half different, since she was half human? How could you tell? In what ways were they different?  What things did they know? What powers did they have? Now that he knew the truth, what would he see when he looked at them? What small details, gone unnoticed up till now, would give their alien nature away? Those pots full of flowers, for one thing – where else did flowers grow in Midgar?  How did she do that? And what if she caught him watching her? What if she could sense his suspicions?  What if she could read his mind? He had always had the feeling with her that she knew more about him than he had willingly let on.

            But Aerith… she was just an innocent child. That’s all she was. A little girl.

            It was wrong. It was unfair. He couldn’t do it.

            A fortnight passed. His longing for Aerith tugged at his heartstrings. But his fear, and his anger at having been deceived, were stronger.

            Then a morning came when Veld strode into the office, took hold of him by the ear, and dragged him into the corridor.  “What the hell do you think you’re playing at?” he growled. “Ifalna’s been asking me if you’re sick. She says the girl’s been crying every day because you don’t visit.  Do you want to undo all our hard work? Get up there, now, and apologise.”

            Aerith opened the door. “Tseng!” she cried joyfully, throwing her arms around his waist. “Mummy! It’s Tseng! He’s better!”

            Mrs Gast came out of the kitchen, drying her hands on her apron. “It’s good to see you,” she smiled. “We were worried.”

            He could not meet her eyes.

            She laid a hand on his head. This was something she often did in passing. It always felt to Tseng a bit like a blessing, though he would have been far too embarrassed to say so.  This time, though, her touch bore an unaccustomed weight.  His head tilted under its pressure.

            “Tseng,” she said, “Look at me.”

            He was fourteen years old, and as tall as she was.  When he meet her gaze, his eyes were on a level with hers. She looked younger than the Commander; one might have guessed she was the same age as Natalya. _A long-lived race. _How old was she, really? The Commander had never said.

            She saw all this in his eyes, just as he had known she would. “Piet told you, didn’t he?”

            After a moment, Tseng nodded.

            “And that’s why you stayed away?”

            He blurted out, “Why did you lie to me?”

            “Lie to you?” She sounded astonished. “How did I lie to you, Tseng?”

            It was hard to find the words for what he felt. But he knew he had been deceived. He had been led to believe one thing, when all the time the truth was something else.

            “You never told me. You let me think you were just ordinary… Normal -”

            “Normal?”   She stepped away from him as if she had been stung. “Normal?” Her coppery eyes blazed.  “You, a Turk – you think you know what is normal?  Is it normal to bring children up in an office building? Never seeing sunlight? Is it normal to put a gun in the hands of a thirteen year old? Is that normal in your world, Tseng? To teach a child to kill?”

            Around his wrist he felt the pressure of Aerith’s fingers. She, too, had never seen her mother angry before.  He lifted the frightened girl into his arms. “It’s all right,” he murmured into her ear. To Mrs Gast he said, “I’m here to protect you. Why don’t you understand?”

            Ifalna pressed the back of her hand to her mouth. The quick blaze of anger had already faded. Her eyes were soft and brown and sad again. “Oh, Tseng. I understand – “

            “I do what’s necessary. But I would never hurt Aerith. I would never hurt either of you.”

            “I know,” she said gently. “Oh, Tseng, I do know that. My dear child, let’s not fight with each other. Aerith and I don’t have so many friends that we can afford to drive one away.  I understand why you feel I deceived you. But if I didn’t mention it, it was because I never felt it mattered. The differences between people are not important. I am still the same woman I’ve always been.  Aerith is still Aerith. And we have missed you. “

            “I missed you so much,” said Aerith, hugging his neck and kissing his check. “Don’t be mad at us.”

            _She’s imitating her mother_, he realized. _She doesn’t really understand any of what just passed. It’s not her fault; she’s only a little girl._

            From that day forward things were never quite easy again between Veld’s youngest Turk and the last remaining Cetra. Both of them felt the estrangement, yet neither knew how to undo it.  Tseng was not someone who gave his trust easily. Still, he visited their apartment almost as often as he had done before, because it was his job.

            Because of Aerith.

            Months passed.

            The year turned, and Aerith was seven. She could read and write, cook simple dishes, and sew a straight seam; she could form her own opinions, and she wasn’t shy about expressing them.  She wanted Tseng to teach her how to shoot a gun. She wanted a kitten. Chocobo racing was cruel: she’d seen it on the TV. One of the birds fell and broke its leg and had to be put down. That wasn’t right. Had it asked to run in races? And why couldn’t she go to school? Other kids went to school. She had seen them on TV. And why couldn’t they go for one of those holidays she’d seen advertised, in Costa del Sol? She wanted to see the ocean. If she could be any animal in the world, she would be a dolphin. Dolphins were the most intelligent mammals. Eating meat was cruel: it was mean to kill a living thing just to eat it.  She was going to be vegetarian. When she grew up, she was going to be a doctor. Or maybe a materia hunter.  Or maybe a Turk.

            Rufus Shinra first appeared in their lives around this time.  He simply materialized at Mrs Gast’s door one day, a small, blond, pretty child in a sailor suit, pulled to that spot by whatever mysterious force it is that draws children together. A flurry of phone calls ensued, and in short order a starched nanny arrived to escort him back to the penthouse. He went kicking and struggling, and the next day he returned. This time, the powers that be allowed him to stay. It was the shape of things to come. Even at five years old, when Rufus wanted something, Rufus got it.

            “He is an annoying baby,” said Aerith. She resented having to share Tseng’s attention. But Rufus wiled himself into her good graces: he submitted to being her doll, allowing her to dress him up in her old clothes and to brush his long, curly hair; he played ‘going shopping’ and ‘tea party’ as if he enjoyed it. He was the tonberry felled by her Turk, the naughty class dunce to her ruler-wielding schoolmarm.  His reward for putting up with all this girl play was to be allowed to look at, and sometimes even touch, Tseng’s gun.

            “Must you bring it here?” Mrs Gast asked him.

            “I forget I’m wearing it,” he told her truthfully in his new, deep voice. He was fifteen by Veld’s reckoning, and a head taller than she. He’d been wearing that gun under his suit for almost three years now. Without it he felt vulnerable. Naked.

            He’d long ago stopped keeping count of the monsters he’d killed.

            The long-anticipated war with Wutai had finally broken out. Commander Veld was visiting Mrs Gast more often these days – two, sometimes three times a week. When he arrived, Mrs Gast asked Tseng to take the children out. Veld protested, “I have nothing to say to you that he can’t hear,” but she was firm. “It’s my daughter I’m thinking of.”

            There was something ominous about the frequency of these visits.  The shadow Hojo cast over Ifalna and her child was growing longer.  Tseng sensed they were living on borrowed time.

            Finally the day came when the Commander walked into Ifalna’s apartment without knocking. “Tseng,” he said, “Take Rufus back to the penthouse. Leave Aerith here.” His tone was clipped and urgent.   Ifalna, too, sensed that something was wrong. Instantly she stood up, forgetting the plate of cookies balanced on her knee.  They fell to the floor: the plate shattered, and the cookies rolled away under the sofa. Tseng got down on his hands and knees to pick up the jagged shards of plate before the children could cut themselves.

            “Leave that,” Veld snapped. “Just go.”

            Rufus went willingly enough, pleased to have Tseng to himself for the duration of the elevator ride. Tseng handed him over to his nanny and hurried back down. As soon as the elevator doors opened on the Gasts’ floor he could hear raised voices and the sound of Aerith crying. Ifalna’s door was ajar: the three infantrymen stood on guard outside, their faces hidden by their helmets. 

            Ifalna was shouting, “You’re the one who refuses to listen, Piet. How many times do I have to say it?”

            Tseng slipped through the door and shut it. Aerith ran to him. “Stop them,” she begged. ”Stop them, stop them.”

            “You’re throwing dust in our eyes,” Veld shouted back. “Seven years I’ve protected you and all you can give me is this Lifestream bullshit.  Dead is dead. Gast is dead. My wife is dead. Felicia is dead. You can’t talk to them and you can’t bring them back. We will never see them again.  Accept it. They’re _gone_.”

            Ifalna gasped. “How can you believe that? It’s too cruel – “

            “Cruel? Cruel? I’ll tell you what’s cruel. To fob me off with fairy tales and try to buy time by talking me into believing that my daughter’s essence, her _soul – _“ he spat out the word – “Still exists in some form, somewhere – that’s what’s cruel. That is an evil thing to do.”

            “That’s not what I said. You are deliberately twisting  – “

            “Why don’t you prove it to me, then? Go on. Talk to her. Tell me something only she and I would know. Do that, and I’ll believe you.”

            “I can’t do that.”

            “No?” The Commander snorted sarcastically. “My, there’s a surprise.  You know, Ifalna, I used to think you were just pig-headed, but now I think you actually take pleasure inthe pain you inflict on me.”

            “Oh!” cried Ifalna, “You hypocrite – “

            He hit her, slapping her open-handed across the mouth. She fell back against the wall, hands raised to ward him off.

            Aerith screamed.

            “Shut up,” said Veld. 

            For a few moments he continued to stand there, fists clenched, breathing heavily, glaring at Mrs Gast. Tseng recognized the look in his eyes. He was itching to beat her into submission.  Ifalna seemed to know what that look meant, too. She returned his stare defiantly, daring him to try.

            The Commander was the first to drop his gaze. “I can’t help you any more,” he said, sounding suddenly exhausted. “If you won’t meet me halfway, then there’s nothing more I can do. Just remember, Ifalna, this was your choice.”

            He turned to go.

            “Piet,” said Ifalna. “Wait.”

            He stopped, though he did not turn round.

            She said, “You can’t find what you seek because you don’t believe in what you’re looking for. But it will find you, where you least expect it.”

            “Stuff your riddles,” Veld snarled. He went out, slamming the door behind him.

            Aerith ran to her mother and clung to her, shaking with fear. Ifalna kissed her daughter over and over. Then she looked up at Tseng. Her lip was bleeding. A bruise was forming on her cheek. The Director must have hit her earlier, when Tseng was out of the room. Why did she have to be so obstinate?

            “How can you do this to Aerith?” he cried. “Why can’t you just tell him?”

            “You have to help us,” said Ifalna, pulling herself upright. “We have to get out of here, now.”

            “I can’t help you to escape. You can’t ask me to do that.”

            “The President’s giving us to Hojo. He signed the order today. Is that what you want for Aerith, Tseng? To be a sample in his labs? An experiment?”

            “Of course not!”

            “I’ll kill her myself before I let that beast have her.” Ifalna looked round wildly. Her gaze found a knife lying on the table. Tseng saw it at the same time and moved to grab it, but desperation lent Ifalna speed. In one swift motion she snatched up the knife and held it against her daughter’s throat.

            He drew his gun and leveled it at her face.

            Ifalna laughed. “Are you going to shoot me, Turk? Will that save her, if you kill me?”

            Aerith stood motionless, the pressure of the knife’s blade creasing the skin under her chin. “Please,” she said in a small voice, “Please, please, Tseng, don’t hurt mummy. Please.”

            Tseng himself was on the brink of panic. What could he do? What should he do?

            _Don’t feel, think._

            If he shot Ifalna, Hojo would take Aerith. If he did not let her go, Ifalna would kill Aerith. There was no other choice. He was out of options.

            Lowering the gun, he said, “What do you want me to do?”

            “Go to your materia room. Get me something – Sleep, or Stop, either will do. I don’t want to hurt anyone. All I want is to keep Aerith safe. Be as fast as you can. We don’t have much time.”

            All the way to the materia room his mind was working furiously, trying to find some other solution.  He desperately hoped he would run into somebody – Natalya or Knox, or best of all, the Commander – who would stop him, ask him what he thought he was doing, and take the matter out of his hands.  But the office was empty. He selected four materia and rode the elevator back up to the apartment, dreading, hoping, that he would find them dead or gone. But the three infantrymen were still on guard, and when he went inside Ifalna was still crouched against the wall, one arm round Aerith’s neck, the other hand clutching the knife.

            “Now what?” he asked.

            “Put them on the table.  Keep one. Now – go out, but leave the door open so I can see what you’re doing. Go to the elevator and press the call button.  Then cast the materia on my guards.  That will give us time to get away.  You should leave before they wake up. And please - don’t follow us.”

            He did as she asked.  The three guards slumped to the ground, dazed and helpless. Ifalna lowered the knife. Aerith jumped into her mother’s arms, wrapping her legs tightly around Ifalna’s waist. Ifalna scooped the materia from the table into her pocket. The elevator pinged. Clutching her child to her heart, Ifalna poised to run. The elevator doors slid open.

            Another infantryman stepped out.

            A moment was enough for him to take in the scene: his unconscious comrades, the prisoner’s open door, the prisoner herself caught red-handed in the act of escaping with her child, and the boy Turk with a gun in his hand –

            Tseng shot him.

            At point-blank range the bullet pierced the bridge of his nose and blasted a hole in the back of his skull, spraying brain and bone and blood across the company logo on the wall behind.

            Ifalna thrust her fist into her mouth to keep from crying out. Aerith was too shocked to make a sound.

            Tseng had never killed a man before. Only monsters.

            In the aftermath of the gun’s report, a silence fell that seemed to last for hours.

            Then Tseng woke up to the realization that the elevator doors were closing. He wedged them open with one foot. “Quick,” he said to Ifalna.

            She and Aerith had to step over the infantryman’s body to reach the elevator. His foot holding the door open, Tseng leaned inside, flipped open a panel, and entered a code on the numbered keypad. “It’s an override,” he explained. “Now it won’t stop till you reach the mezzanine. Mingle with the crowds. It’s safest. You’ll need money – “

            He gave her all the gil he had. He wanted to give her the gun too, but she wouldn’t take it.

            “But thank you,” she said, and kissed him. Tears were running down her cheeks. Aerith wouldn’t look at him. Her face was pressed against her mother’s shoulder.

            He moved his foot. The doors closed.

            They were gone.

            Tseng walked down the stairs to the Turks’ floor.  The office was still empty. He sat in the lounge and watched the small hand of the clock judder forward, slow second by second, until ten minutes had passed. Then he opened his phone and called the Commander.

 

*

 

            For more than three hours he waited as he had been told to, until eventually Veld returned to the office and told him that Mrs Gast was dead, shot by one of Heidegger’s trigger-happy grunts. Though mortally wounded, she’d managed to escape them by throwing the materia. Her dead body had been found at the Sector 7 train station.

             _My fault_, thought Tseng, _my fault, my fault._

He would have cried if he could, but his eyes were so dry they burned.

            “Aerith,” he said. “Where is she?”

            “No sign of her. We’ll keep looking, of course, but a little girl like that, alone in the slums…. It’s unlikely she’ll survive for very long. And then there’s Sergeant Mehta, dead for doing his job. So. Are you proud of your day’s work, Tseng?”

            _What do you think?_ Tseng wanted to shout back. _I tried to save them and now Mrs Gast is dead and Aerith is lost because of me. I didn’t mean to kill the sergeant. He took me surprise; it just happened. I didn’t know what else to do. Why did you go away and leave me?_

            “She was bluffing,” said the Commander.  “No mother would ever harm her child. She lied.  She used you. Do you see that now? It was her plan all along, I think. “

            _No_, thought Tseng, _that’s not true. She was my friend.  _

            But how he could be sure of anything any more?

            “After I left you,” the Commander went on, “I went to talk to the President again, to try to get him to overturn the order. To give me a little more time. I was managing to make some headway – and then, you called. He wants your skin, my boy. And I’ve a mind to let him have it.”

            By the time the Director was finished with him, Tseng’s back was in shreds and two of his bones were broken and all he could think about was the pain, which was, he realized afterwards, Veld’s kindness.  It was less a punishment than an absolution: the pain was like a fire that swept through his soul, burning up and cleaning away the dead wood of self-recrimination, and, when it had passed, leaving him light-headed and detached on the other side of the scorched earth. 

            If souls even existed. The Commander didn’t think so.  But what, then, was Tseng to call this thing inside him that had been beaten in the forge and come out harder, colder, resilient, like steel? 

            Life went on. One year succeeded another, years of warfare, growth, and incremental victories. Tseng rose through the ranks, moved out of the Shinra building, found his own apartment, took lovers of both sexes, sometimes for work and occasionally for pleasure. Old Turks died or were transferred to branch offices. New Turks replaced them: Mozo, Charlie, Rosalind; Rude, Cissnei, Reno.

             Five years went by; and then, one day, Tseng heard a rumour of flowers growing in the old church in the Sector 5 slums.  He knew at once who was responsible; he’d never really been able to believe she was dead. So he took the train down to the market and picked his way along the rubble in the streets until he came to the door of the church, opened it, and went in. She was up at the far end, standing beside a bed of yellow and white flowers that appeared to be giving off some kind of light – though that, surely, must be his eyes playing tricks in the gloom.

            How old was she now? Twelve? Dressed in boy’s shorts and a grey sleeveless pullover, she was taller and skinnier, and her hair was longer, but otherwise she was unchanged. She, too, recognised him straight away. But this time there was no joyous shout of greeting, no jumping into his arms.  It was not fear in her eyes, exactly, or hatred, but it was something close. She took a step backwards.

            He stayed where he was and said, “Don’t be afraid.”

            “I’m not going back.” Her declaration echoed boldly round the nave. “You can’t make me.”

            “I haven’t come to take you back. I wanted to be sure it was you. Are you all right?”

            She took another step. If he moved, if he startled her in anyway, she would run.

            “Go away!” she shouted. “Leave me alone!”

            “Is this where you live? Are you on your own? Is anyone looking after you?”

            “I’m not going to tell you, Turk!”

            “All right. That’s fine. You don’t have to. Listen - Do you need money? Look, here’s money.” Very slowly, like a man disarming himself, he took a wad of gil from his inside pocket and laid it down on the nearest pew.

            “I don’t want your money!”

            “That’s OK. Maybe you know somebody who needs it. Aerith – “ After so many years, it was sweet to taste her name on his tongue once more. He said it again, “Aerith, I haven’t come to hurt you or to take you back. My job is to keep you safe. Do you understand that?”

            “Why did you have to come here? Why couldn’t you stay away?”

            “I have to know that you’re all right. Just tell me that, Aerith. Tell me you’re all right. Please.”

             Was it his imagination, or did her expression soften just a little?

            “I’m fine. Now stop asking questions and go away.”

            She was right. He mustn’t rush her.

            “Whatever you want,” he said. “Look, I’m going now. But I will come back, just to check on you. You don’t have to worry. You’ll be safe. I promise you.”

            She never took her eyes off him the whole time he was backing out of the church. And yet he couldn’t help feeling that some part of her, some little part, had been glad to see him.  Or maybe that was just wishful thinking.

            Back at the office he went straight to the Commander.

            Veld was rarely astonished by anything, but on this occasion it took him a few moments to assimilate what his lieutenant was trying to tell him.  When he finally, fully understood that Ifalna’s daughter was alive and well and growing flowers in the slums beneath his feet, he laughed out loud, punched the air, and enfolded Tseng in a bear hug.

            Rejoicing done, they got down to business. Veld thought, and Tseng agreed with him, that this time around they should handle the primary objective differently.  Since certain executives on the board advocated methods that were bound to be counter-productive, it was in the company’s best interests to keep Aerith’s existence a secret known only to the Turks.  They would watch her, protect her, and ensure her survival. Tseng would continue to cultivate her friendship and try to win back her trust. There was no guarantee that she would ever tell them what she knew - if, indeed, she knew anything at all about the mystery her mother had died to protect. But it was the only way. In this, as in so many things, Tseng found that he and the Commander were of one mind.

            What he didn’t share with Veld was the decision he had made, on the way back from the church, that if he were ever ordered to bring Aerith in, he would shoot her. Two bullets: one bullet in the base of her skull, where it wouldn’t hurt and she would never know what hit her. A second bullet for himself. Strange that it should be such a comforting thought, to know that death was the worst thing that could happen…

            “Complicated?”

            Zack’s voice brought Tseng back to the present moment: church, slums, SOLDIER, helicopter hovering above, the necessity of travelling to Modeoheim.

            “Really?” Zack added.

            Was it Tseng’s imagination, or did Zack sound a little – suspicious?

            _Zack Fair, _thought Tseng, _what a simple soul you are._

            He asked, “Has she said anything to you?”

            “Not a thing,” Zack admitted.

            Tseng shrugged. “Then I won’t either.”

            The noise generated by the helicopter’s descent rendered further conversation impossible.

 

 

 


	6. There Are Things We Don't Talk About

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Tseng reports to Veld on the mission to Modeoheim

_Form S-DAR.MIS/REP:6A_

_SHINRA ELECTRIC COMPANY_

_Department of Administrative Research_

_Mission Report_

_Mission to:               Modeoheim_

_Mission Objective:      Liquidation of SOLDIER 1_ _st_ _ Class Angeal Hewley_

_Agents:                   Tseng_

_Accompanied by:       SOLDIER 1_ _st_ _ Class Zack Fair; 2x infantrymen: Strife, Pearlman_

_Mission Date:            October 31st 2001_

_Report filed by:         Tseng, ID S-DAR.M/54.S_

_Mission status:          Accomplished_

_Journeyed to Modeoheim via helicopter. Observed from air significant increase in monster activity. Helicopter attacked and brought down by griffin. No casualties. Weather -11° with heavy snow cover. Proceeded from crash site to Modeoheim on foot. Halted on mountainside to observe disused mako factory; Fair and Strife sent to investigate. Factory infested with Genesis copies. Fair and Strife eliminated these and proceeded to basement, where they found Genesis Rhapsodos in an advanced state of degradation, apparently attempting to kill Professor Hollander. Fair fought Genesis and reports that he fell into the mine shaft and is likely dead (for details, see Fair’s report filed with SOLDIER)._

_     Hollander escaped from factory. Strife, Pearlman and I pursued him. Hollander ran into derelict bathhouse. I left Pearlman to guard entrance and went inside with Strife. No sign of Hollander. Killed several cuahl-type monsters. Proceeded up interior stairs, and found Target._

_     Target recognised me and approached. He asked if I had come to kill him. Answered Target in the affirmative. Had brief conversation. Was taken by surprise by Hollander who came out from upstairs room firing a gun. Private Strife wounded. I returned fire. Target cast materia that rendered Strife and myself unconscious._

_     Awoke to see Zack Fair battling large monster of unidentifiable type, Hollander attempting to escape. Private Strife and I apprehended Hollander. Fair killed monster._

_     Returned to Midgar…_

     Veld glanced up from the printout to put a question to Tseng, who was sitting on the other side of the desk. “The monster was Angeal?”

            “In some way that I don’t understand, yes, sir. When Zack killed it, it vaporized, and Angeal was left behind. He died a few moments later.”

            “So it was much more than just the wing?”

            Tseng hesitated. The Commander seemed to be missing the point, probably because Tseng had failed to explain himself clearly. There were some things it was wiser not to commit to paper, when you worked in Shinra.

            He said, “Angeal wanted to die. He was waiting for Zack. He wanted Zack to do it. No one else.”

            Veld laid down the paper and looked hard into his lieutenant’s face. “How do you know this?”

            “He told me.”

            Veld frowned. “You allowed yourself to be distracted -”

            “Sir, Hollander talked to Zack. About Project G. And Jenova.”

            The furrow between Veld’s thick brows deepened ominously. “What exactly did he say?”

            “He told him about Angeal’s mother Gillian and how her cells were mapped onto Genesis.”

            “But what did he say about Jenova? Did he tell Zack what Jenova _is?_”

            “I can’t remember – “

            _You don’t want to remember, _his conscience protested_. You want to forget what you saw - _

            Though he had told himself beforehand that he would not bring his emotions into this, Tseng’s hands now betrayed him. They began to shake. He tried willing them to stop. They only trembled more violently. Quickly he trapped them between his knees, not wanting the Commander to see. But it was no good. His teeth were chattering now. He could feel himself shivering all over.

            “What’s wrong?” asked the Commander, pushing his chair back and standing up. “Tseng? Are you ill?”

            “I saw it,” said Tseng. “I saw all of it.”

            He had come back to consciousness on the upstairs landing of the bathhouse. To his right, Private Strife was slumped against the wall, groaning. Overhead Tseng could hear heavy footsteps and voices.  With his legs numb from the after-effects of Angeal’s materia attack, he had crawled through the hole in the wall, up the frozen heating pipes, and across the top floor, until he reached the doorway to the bathhouse loft, getting there in time to hear Hollander telling Zack about the experiments that had made Angeal and Genesis.

            Above their heads the roof was broken; a sunset glow filled the room. Zack’s face was a mingling of horror and disbelief. Angeal’s held nothing but despair. Tseng tried to draw his gun, to shut Hollander up, but his fingers fumbled uselessly and he dropped the weapon. It made a loud noise as it hit a metal pipe. Not one of the three men heard it.

            Angeal pushed Hollander hard, knocking him into a corner of the room, where he lay winded. Angeal then turned to Zack.

            - _Remember when I told you that our enemy is everything that creates suffering?_

_            - Yes, but that’s not you, _Zack cried.

            - _Isn’t it? I torment myself. Look. I’ll show you._

And then the indescribable thing, the living nightmare.

            Tseng had thought he’d seen it all: every monstrosity, every extreme of evil, this planet had to offer. But the creature that assembled itself in that loft room in Modeoheim was something nature had never planned or intended. It was man-made.

            He knew what happened in the labs. He’d taken subjects in. He’d disposed of the failures and rejects.  He didn’t ask questions; he neither judged nor apologized. That was not his job.

            But when it happened to a man he knew well, a man he admired and respected; when Angeal became a monster in front of his eyes, then there was no looking the other way.  He had to see the truth for what it was and call it by its name, even if that name could never be uttered aloud.

            Abomination.

            _Stop it,_ _Angeal_, Zack had cried out, _you don’t know what you’re doing! _

            Even then, and right to the bitter end, Zack had thought he could save the man he worshipped. He had believed he was fighting for Angeal’s life.

            _It would have been better if Angeal had let me shoot him_, thought Tseng. _How cruel, how monstrous, to make Zack do it. _

            But Turks did not speak of these things.

            Veld pressed a shinrafoam cup of coffee into Tseng’s trembling fingers. “Drink it,” he ordered. He’d loaded it with sugar, bitter-sweet. The heat and the sugar steadied Tseng’s nerves.  Between long sips he breathed deeply, inhaling the steamy aroma, forcing his senses to focus on the familiar details of Veld’s office: the smoothness of the chair’s leather upholstery; the grain of the wood in the Commander’s desk; the plastic pot plants in the corner that neither grew nor flowered. Bit by bit the nightmare receded, and Tseng had himself back under control.  

            The Commander laid a hand, warm and heavy, on his lieutenant’s shoulder, let it rest there for a moment or two. Then he moved back to the other side of the table, took his seat, and picked up a pen.  Though there were many things of which they might never speak, one aspect of this affair was clearly Turk business, and they needed to deal with it now.

            “If he knows about Project G, then Zack Fair has become a potential security risk,” said Veld.

            Tseng raised his head. The implications of what Veld had just said were not slow to sink in. Zack’s life was hanging in the balance.

            “He won’t talk,” said Tseng.

            “How can you be sure?”

            “He’ll want to protect Angeal’s memory. If any of what happened at Modeoheim became public knowledge, it would dishonour Angeal.”

            “Of course, honour,” mused Veld. “So Angeal infected Zack with his old-fashioned notions, did he? Probably no bad thing, from our point of view. Angeal knew how to make good SOLDIERs. Lazard won’t find it easy to replace him.”

            “Lazard can’t afford to lose any more First Classes,” Tseng pointed out. “Morale in SOLDIER’s rock bottom as it is. If Zack were to go missing in action, I think it would finish Lazard.”

            “But would that be a bad thing? You know I always thought it was a mistake to appoint him to SOLDIER.  You don’t put a loaded gun in the hands of a man with a grudge… especially when he’s never handled a gun before in his life.  Lazard’s out of his depth, and without Angeal to hold them together, SOLDIER could easily become a liability for us.”

            “But don’t you think, sir, that if Lazard were to go, SOLDIER would probably be transferred to Heidegger’s command? It started off as part of the regular armed forces, didn’t it?  How would that benefit us? If Lazard can’t afford to lose any more Firsts, we can’t afford to lose any of our allies in the boardroom, and right now he and Reeve are the only ones we’ve got.”

            Veld smiled. “There’s always Rufus.”

            Tseng was not amused. Seeing him frown, Veld gave his throaty chuckle. “Oh, cut the boy some slack. He only wants to impress you.  And he’s a clever little bugger when he wants to be.  If he weren’t who he is I might think seriously about recruiting him.”

            “Could we finish with Zack Fair, sir, please?”

            The Commander sat back in his chair, cracking the knuckles of his real hand with his prosthetic fingers. “All right. You can have Zack, Tseng. For now. I trust your judgment, even though I know you’re an old sentimentalist. But watch him.”

            “We already do, sir.”

            “Then watch him closer.”

 

 


	7. Words Aren't The Only Things

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Zack and Aerith take their relationship to another level.

            _Surveillance Duty, 5th November 2001_

At midday, high in the rafters of the Church, Knox hands over to Mink. She asks him, “Any sign of Zack Fair?” Knox shakes his head.

            They both know what happened in Modeoheim. All the Turks have been briefed. They also know that the SOLDIER hasn’t been to see his girlfriend since he returned from that mission, almost a week ago now.

            Mink settles her back against the wall and puts her boots up on one of the barrels. Far below, the young girl in her striped summer dress is kneeling by her flowers. She tends to them as if they were children, stroking their petals and murmuring endearments. The towering stone walls and the vaulted ceiling act like an echo chamber, magnifying every sound she makes up. From up here, Mink can even hear Aerith breathing.

            Nothing more exciting than that will happen; nothing ever happens, but Mink doesn’t mind. She likes to be alone with her thoughts.

            Four hours pass.  Mink may have dozed off. The door to the church swings open loudly. Mink squints. There’s not much light around the door, but she can make out a dark-haired figure in black. She sits up, wondering if it’s the boss.

            The figure walks forward, passes through one of the rainbows of light falling through the stained-glass windows, and she sees it is Zack Fair. The sword wound on his left jaw is raw, ugly.

            Aerith jumps up and runs to greet him. But he’s changed since the last time Mink saw him.  The easy warmth, the boyish grin, are gone. He holds himself stiffly; tries to smile, but fails. Aerith falters. Her arms, raised in welcome, drop to her sides.

            He tells her to go back to the flowers; he just wants to sit down quietly and watch her for a while. OK, she says, puzzled, but willing to go along with whatever he asks.  He takes a seat in one of the pews. Aerith bends down with her back to him, running her fingers coaxingly along the flowers’ leaves. Zack stares at her, unblinking. Does he see her? What is he seeing? His face is blank with grief.

            Mink knows that look, so well.

            After a while he gets restless and asks Aerith if she wants to go find something to eat.  She is happy to agree. They head off towards the Sector 5 market; Mink slips along discretely behind. Aerith puts her hand in his. He grasps it so tightly the girl winces. They wander rather aimlessly from stall to stall. Mink guesses neither of them is really hungry. It’s just something to do. Zack buys two apples from the fruit stall – dry, wrinkled, dusty things, but as good as you’ll get down in the slums.  Aerith bites into hers. Zack’s fingers close round his. He says to Aerith, _in Banora, the apples are blue…_

_            Where’s Banora?_ asks Aerith.

            _In Mideel. It was. It’s not there any more._

_            Why, what happened to it?_

_            It doesn’t matter_, says Zack.

            They walk on, and after a while the apple falls from his hand, forgotten.

            Aerith knows something’s wrong, thought she doesn’t know what. She can tell he’s not really with her.  Mink sees the determination come into her face: the girl’s smooth jaw has set firm. Aerith’s decided to fix it. She’ll find some way to get through to him, some way to make him look at her and smile.

            She says, _Let’s go back to the Church._

They’re out of Mink’s sight while she climbs back up into the rafters. Once in position, she sees that Aerith is again tending to the flowers, while Zack is sitting on the wooden floor of the nave. They have their backs to each other. Afternoon is turning to evening. Sunrise and sunset are the only times the slums get any direct light, when the sun, low on the horizon, shoots its fading rays under the plate, and for perhaps a quarter of an hour gilds the homes and faces of the poor with a transient loveliness.

            Aerith raises her face to the roof. Mink shrinks back into the shadows, but it’s the hole in the roof Aerith’s looking at. In the evening light, the plate above their heads has turned to gold.

            She says, _Hey, Zack, the sky is closer in the city above, right? Kind of scary._ She turns towards him. _But the flowers might like it, maybe…._

He’s crying.

            His whole body is shaking with sobs. The sound of his hopelessness fills the Church.

            Aerith hesitates.

            Do it, thinks Mink, do it, do it.

            Aerith walks over to Zack, kneels beside him. She put her arms around his shaking shoulders, lays her cheek against his wounded face.  He clutches at her. _Aerith. I’m going to pieces._

She kisses him gently, on the temple, just beside the ear.  Her fingertips stroke the skin of his neck, the way she touches the flowers.  Zack’s breath comes in shuddering gasps. Aerith’s arms tighten around him. She closes her eyes. Her lips move across his face, kissing his eyebrows, his eyelids, his scarred jaw, his salty cheeks, until at last her mouth finds his.

            Both of them are shaking now.

            He returns her kiss, tentatively at first, then with increasing passion. His hands run down her arms. Their fingers interlock. She leans into him, pressing herself against his body. One of his hands moves to hold her by the hip, then slowly feels its way upward along the line of her flank to cup her little breast.

            Aerith’s eyes fly open. There is heat in them, and joy.

            She looks straight up, straight into Mink’s face.

            In the shock of being seen, and the instant understanding that Aerith has known all along she was there, Mink can do nothing but stare back.

            Aerith’s mouth forms the words _Go away_.

            Speechless, Mink nods.

            She slips silently through the hole in the roof and walks along the fallen girders to a spot touched by an evening sunbeam. Here she sits. She gives them an hour by her PHS clock. When she returns to the Church, they are gone. A part of the flower bed has been crushed. For a moment it strikes Mink as oddly careless that they would have lain on Aerith’s precious flowers. Then she realizes that the flowers don’t mind. Their bruised petals are giving off an intense aroma, lavender mixed with rose, the smell of happiness and peace. Inhaling their fragrance, Mink’s own heart lifts.

            Who is this girl?Mink’s never asked questions; she makes a point of it. But now she can’t help wondering.

            She’s not got Reno’s nose, but the flower smell is so strong that it’s easy to track Zack and Aerith through the slums. Nothing else smells like flowers down here.  In any case, Mink can guess where they’re heading. She was a young girl too, once. She catches up to them as they reach the gate of Elmyra Gainsborough’s house, and watches them go in. It looks like Elmyra is out.  Mink takes up position in the shadows of an alley opposite, and settles down to watch the street.

            It’s  19.57 by her PHS when she sees Elmyra appear in the distance, carrying a shopping bag. Mink picks up a couple of pebbles and throws them at Aerith’s window. If that doesn’t work, the Turk will think of some other stratagem. But just as Elmyra is turning in the gate, Zack Fair exits through the back door, vaults over the fence, and set off down the street at a run. Mink manages to catch a glimpse of his face as he passes.  He’s smiling.

           Oh Aerith, thinks Mink, wise girl. Wise woman.

            There’s no need to keep watching Aerith now that her foster mother is home. Mink sets off in Zack’s direction, tails him all the way back to HQ. When she gets back up to the office she sits down straight away and conscientiously writes her surveillance report. She emails it to Tseng as an encrypted attachment. Then she runs through the password sequence for logging off, powers down, tidies some files, and takes herself to bed, feeling that something good has happened today. For a change.

 


	8. Tonight, in Our Perfect World

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which love hurts, in many different ways.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of this chapter is taken directly from the relevant episode of Before Crisis.

            _Tseng at three a.m._

He is lying alone in a rumpled bed in a room that rents by the hour. Its exact location doesn’t matter; he knows many such places. This particular room is on the third floor. Its window looks out onto the street.  The sash is raised six inches, admitting a damp, slightly chilly breeze that strokes his bare skin, raising goosebumps.  Across the street hangs a neon sign for a 24-hour launderette; its red glow lends the room an illusory warmth. He can hear laughter from the bar on the corner, and footsteps walking along the pavement: the click of a woman’s heels, the slap of a man’s brogues.

            Never the same partner twice. It’s easier that way. One less complication. He has tried relationships (he has tried most things); when he was Aerith’s age, Zack’s age, he had a series of what, for want of a more exact term, might be called lovers. Always the claustrophobia became unbearable.

            Through trial and error he grew to understand himself better. 

            These days he knows what he wants (and what he doesn’t want) and where to find it; when he sees what he’s looking for they recognize each other even though they’ve never met before and would look the other way if they passed in the street tomorrow. Drinks are bought and desultory conversation made, really just out of politeness (or the atavistic need for some sort of ritual?) followed by an hour, or less, in a bed that belongs to neither of them.  Sometimes he leaves first, but he prefers it when they do.  He likes being alone like this, naked in an anonymous room, holding his life at arm’s length for a little while. It’s a moment of truce in the ongoing battle.

            His arm is folded across his face. His eyes are open.

            He is thinking of a phrase: _the act of love_.

            He considers it from a variety of angles, tests it for its ability to bear weight.  It fails. The definition is too narrow.

            He has given her a lifetime of devotion.  Stood guard. Learnt patience. Been reasonable. Borne pain. Practised silence. All acts of love. Why don’t they count?

            But these are the thoughts he came here to escape. He tries to blank them out, to focus instead on the experience of breathing: the cool air stealing his heat as it enters his body through the moist passages of his mouth and nose; his diaphragm tightening, the swell of his lungs forcing his ribcage to strain against the muscles of his chest –

            It’s no good.

            What their lovemaking must be like, Zack’s and Aerith’s, he cannot imagine.  Just as well, probably.

 

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Pages from Aviva’s diary

_6th December 2001_

Yes!!!  Went on a mission with R today.  Joy joy joy!!! Undercover – I wore shorts and stripey thigh socks and my lace-up boots and my new red sleeveless pullover. R in jeans and t-shirt. I hate that black wooly hat he uses, but he has to cover his hair. He puts the goggles on over the hat, to hold it in place. It does make his eyes stand out more. God his eyes are gorgeous. When he was younger they must have been green, but all that materia he takes have made them blueish. Suddenly noticed yesterday that mine are changing too – they used to be jet black, but now they’re like the sky just before it’s completely night. Kind of makes me feel I’m turning into a different person inside and out.  I’m thinking I might grow my hair too.

            Our target: gutter press journilist printing lies about Shinra. We had to watch his house for 2 hrs waiting for him to go out. Pure joy!!! We had fun making up imaginery life stories for the people who went past. R must think I’m insane I laugh so much.  I was laughing bcz I was so happy just to be with him. When R laughs it gives me the butterflies. I love the shape of his mouth and the way that it moves.

            Target went out and we went in – R let me pick the lock. We went straight to target’s office where all his computers and printers were set up.  R wired up the paint bombs and showed me how to prime the trigger.  Next time target sits down to turn on his PC, bang! Poof! – everything soaked in yellow paint, ruined. I said why don’t we just shoot him and R said **** you’re bloodthirsty, aren’t you? But he was laughing.  And I said, no come on, seriosly, wouldn’t it be simpler? And he said, well, what does the Chief always say? Be discreete. Sometimes people ask questions and this journilist is known to be a critic of the company. Getting him to change his tune is better than silencing him.  If we disappere him, fingers will point. So we give him fair warning. If he takes the warning, good for him.  Otherwise, we come back.  I said, we meaning you and me, and he said, yeah, partner.  I love it when he calls me that!!! 

            Went back to the office and R let me write the report. Even that made me happy. Just writing his name, just writing the initial of his name, makes me happy. 

            Is six years really such a big difference? When I’m alone I feel so old inside. But when I’m with him, I forget what I used to be. I feel like a new person. I feel I am exactly who he sees, this dumb funny wet-behind-the-ears crazy kid.  I like being her….

 

*

 

_22nd December 2001_

Rude has a girlfriend!!!! And it looks serious!!!!!!!!

Me and him and R were inspecting the Sector 8 reactor today, double-checking all the plans because the Chief doesn’t think they’re completely accurrate.  When we were finished R wanted to go for drinks like always but Rude didn’t want to come. He said he had something else he needed to do.  He said it in kind of a shy way that made me and R both realize Rude has something he wants to hide. Usually R can make Rude tell but this time Rude gave him the brush off real firm. So then R told me to follow Rude and find out what gives.  R likes to know everything that’s going on, but that wasn’t his only reason. He always thinks he has to take care of Rude, watch out for him. I kind of didn’t want to snoop, because I like Rude and I know how private he is, but on the other hand I kind of did want to, because I’m a nosy parker. 

            I think Rude must have guessed one of us would follow him. He covered his tracks pretty good, and Rude’s kind of noticeable, so he was making a big effort not to be seen. Then I had to stop and help this lady who was being mugged.  Anyway, to cut a long story short, I finally found him in _The Lady Luck_, and he’s sitting with this GORGEOUS girl!!!! Her name is Chelsy. He must have said ‘Chelsy’ a million times this evening.  I hid behind a big plastic pot plant, but probably I didn’t need to. He has eyes for nobody but her. I could practically see the big heart-shaped dream-balloons floating in the air all around them!!! They talked for hours and I got cramp, but it was the sweetest thing and I was kind of glad I got to see it. A different side of Rude. 

            I envy her. If you-know-who ever looked at me the way Rude was looking at her tonight, I think my heart would stop dead from pure extasy. But Chelsey’s beautiful. Oh well. Oh sigh.

            The really strange thing was, Rude wanted to walk her home but she absolutely refused to let him. Why? All night she was looking like she couldn’t wait to fall into his arms….

_*_

_23rd December 2001_

Told R today about Rude and Chelsy and how in love they were. He laughed a lot and said sneaky basterd. I told him about how Chelsy refused to let Rude leave the restaurant with her or walk her home. R said that’s weird. I said what? And he said maybe it means something or maybe nothing. Maybe she’s just not that kind of girl. Too bad for Rude, eh? Then he said that actually he was a bit pissed off. Why hadn‘t Rude told him, when he tells Rude everything? I said, you know Rude can keep a secret but Rude knows you’re a big gossip. And R said, not when it’s serious. Which is true. So R said he would get to the bottom of it, and he left to go see what was happening at the _Lady Luck_.  And I came home and wrote this.

 

*

 

_24th December, Winterday_

            It’s my lunch break. I just want to write quickly what happened yesterday with R and Rude and Chelsey. When R got to the _Lady Luck_ yesterday he saw Chelsy acting very suspicious. Rude went to the bathroom, and she picked up his phone from the counter and started fiddling with it, but then put it back down and looked all around like people do when they feel guilty. (R acted it out for me).

            So R waited until Chelsy left, and the same thing happened, that Rude wanted to go with her but she refused.  R followed her (which I probably should have done) and she went down into the storm drains and inside the plate, and met up with some other people, and it turns out they are AVALANCHE!!!!

            I feel _sick_ writing this.

             R said he could have killed her then and I know what he means. But he stayed hidden and listened and one of the AVALANCHE guys asked her if she’d managed to bug Rude’s phone and she said she didn’t get a chance. But she did. She could have bugged it while he was in the bathroom. So she was lying to AVALANCHE as well as to Rude.

            What the %&amp;*#! is going on?!?!?!

            I said to R well why didn’t you DO something and he said he wants to wait and see what happens, because Chelsy’s promised to meet Rude at the Tree of Lights tonight.

            R told me all this just now and he’s asked me to go with him after work to follow Rude and make sure he’s OK. So that’s the plan. We’re going to teach that lying Chelsy b***h a lesson she won’t forget…..

 

*

 

25th December

            I feel so low today.

            Nothing turned out the way I expected. I guess I should start at the beginning. R and I were heading for the Tree of Lights when the Chief called and said there’d been an outbreak of chimera bugs from the sewers and sent us to find the nest and destroy it. That wasn’t hard, but it took a while. Then on our way back out of the sewers we heard a voice we both recognised. It was Chelsy!!!! We crept forward. She was talking to some guys – AVALANCHE – and she was pleading with them and crying and saying she didn’t want to be part of the plot any longer.  The basterds attacked her!!!! That’s when R and I moved in and killed them. There were four of them. It felt so good. I hadn’t realized before then just how furious I was for what they’d done to Rude. 

            I nearly killed Chelsey too but R stopped me.  He put the point of his rod against her chest just where her heart is and he said if you’ve got one, start talking.  She said she’d been working with AVALANCHE for just a couple of months and they’d told her to get close to Rude and bug his phone so as to infiltrate us. I shouted at her, I said how could you do that? He really loves you!  Don’t you know how lucky you are?!! She said that once she got to know him and saw what a great guy he was, she started to fall in love with him too, and that’s why she was trying to get out of AVALANCHE. But AVALANCHE don’t let anyone leave. I said why do you hate Shinra? Why do you hate us? She said she didn’t know what she felt about anything any more, but she knew it was all over with her and Rude.

            R said, we have safe houses, we can take care of you. You have information we can use. She said she wasn’t a traitor. Kill me if you have to, she said, I don’t care. I’ve already punished myself and fallen in love with a man I can never see again. She said, tell him I’m sorry. Maybe in our next lives we can meet again and it will all work out.  She was crying so much. I felt like my own heart was breaking.

            So I said to R what should we do? And he said The Chief ordered us to get rid of the bugs and we’ve done that so let’s go.  And then he said to Chelsy Don’t ever let me see your face again, because I’ll kill you.  And then we left her there. We went to the Tree of Lights and saw Rude waiting.  R made me go tell him. He said it would be easier coming from me.

            But it wasn’t easy. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. For once I was glad that he wears those sunglasses all the time so I didn’t have to see the look in his eyes.

            And then R comes sauntering in and he’s like, hey, partner, what’s with the long face? Like he doesn’t know. And Rude tells him to Shut the **** up, and swears at him for a while, letting all his feelings out.  R just stands there and takes it. And then he says, it’s kind of cold, let’s go find somewhere warm.

            So we go to the Goblins. Rude didn’t say anything for a long time. We just sat there round the table, R, Rude, me.  After a while I felt like I wanted to hold Rude’s hand, so I did. And then Rude said, I’m not surprised. It never felt right.  Makes sense it was an act all along. 

            I said, That’s not true. She loved you. She did, didn’t she, Reno? She really did love you. You have to believe me.

            And he turns to R and he says kind of slowly, what does that mean, though?

            I said, It means you’re a great guy. She saw it. She wanted to hate you but she couldn’t because you’re so fantastic.  You _made_ her love you just by being you. I was saying anything that came into my head to make him feel better.

            He said, I’m lucky. I have good friends. And he bent over quite a long way because he’s so tall and I’m so titchy, and he kissed my cheek. It was sweet. I was glad I’d cheered him up just a little bit.

            But I wish it had been R who kissed me.

            In our next lives, maybe all our dreams will come true.  

            I wish.


End file.
